Prometheus: New discoveries
by alphalima1980
Summary: Twenty years after the failed expedition of the Prometheus, Dr. Elisabeth "Eli" Monygham, an archaeologist from the Wellington Institute is called to analyze a temple found in the Caucasus. The new discovery would prove that Dr. Elizabeth Shaw's "invitation" theory was wrong and with the future of humanity at risk, Eli should look through old secrets to prevent disaster.
1. Prologue: The Weyland Century

Twentieth first Century had marked a great leap for humanity, advances in medicine, engineering, artificial intelligence, space exploration and Terraforming, thus, a change in political, economic and philosophy promptly followed, climate change reverted, global economy stabilized and even the world's geopolitical map changed, new countries surged from the union and cooperation, as the European Union, the United Americas and the Iranistan Republic, other powers as the Russian-Chinese Federation and the Third world empire, formed by a group of third world nations.

These changes weren't been possible without the involvement of one of the most talented inventors in history. Peter Weyland was labeled by popular magazines like _Life_ or _Colonial Times_ as the most influential people in the Twentieth First century, now colloquially dubbed the Weyland Century. The British engineer had born to a self-taught engineer and an Oxford mythology professor and by the time he had 14, he was a consummated inventor, forming his own company by the age of 22, but was on February 28th in that legendary TED talk when he demonstrated one of his most desired ambitions.

Despite having developed the first advanced cybernetic organism and artificial intelligence, in the form of the David series android, Peter Weyland hadn't been able to produce a son, a worthy heir of his, an obsession which lead the technology tycoon even to neglect his own daughter Meredith. Also, as his god-like delusion nested on his soul, Peter considered his greatest achievements, the cure for cancer, terraforming and faster than light travel worthless; in his mind, a god must be able not only to create life and change the world, things he already had achieved, but to have an immortal life and the gift of Omniscience.

Omniscience is the ability of the al knowing, and yes, Peter Weyland was a genius, but he didn't know everything, including the two greatest questions: How was life created? And what's the purpose of it? Peter Weyland believed that answering those questions and applying reverse engineering at the process he would find the formula to his own immortality, and that's why he embarked in one of the most ambitious endeavor since the age of exploration's quests of El Dorado and the Fountain of Youth.

Officially, the so-called Weyland Century ended with the death of Sir Peter Weyland on his home on Mars. But, just a bunch of high level Execs knew he did in fact disappeared and was presumed dead when his expedition, aboard the recently built U.S.C.S.S _Prometheus_ had parted to one yet unexplored system and never returned. The ship had been commissioned with the intention of discovering the very beginning of human civilization and life itself, based on a theory proposed by two archaeologists –Dr. Elizabeth Shaw and Dr. Charles Holloway –whose thesis had vanish them from the scientific community for its paradigm changing statements, but convincing enough to make Sir Peter believe the dreams and delusions of the old millionaire can be achieved.

But theories are only that, theories, and they can be wrong. A little and apparently insignificant detail could mislead all calculations, and what Elizabeth Shaw and Charly Holloway thought was an invitation from the Gods turned out to be one of the greatest threats mankind had faced. Now, fourteen years after the fatidic expedition, new data had been recovered by an enthusiastic follower of Shaw's theories. But, will she realize the true danger of a gift from the gods?


	2. Chapter 1: A new discovery

**CHAPTER 1: A NEW DISCOVERY**

 **September 21st, 2105. Suffolk, United Kingdom/EU**

The sky was cloudy and weather fairly cold, perfect for that part of the world. Since Sir Peter Weyland had stopped global warming back in 2019, average temperature had dropped to pre-industrial revolution levels and climate had been ideal for agriculture, more food was produced, economy bloomed and finally the resultant economic might was used to advance science. That's how the Wellington Institute was founded in Suffolk, UK.

Eli stepped inside the archaeo-astronomy laboratory of the Wellington Institute. The lab was wide and it had multiple archeological pieces, most notably was the collection of stone plates, vessels and scrolls found by Dr. Elizabeth Shaw and her colleague Dr. Charlie Holloway. Eli, whose full name was Elisabeth Diane Monygham was a post-grade student in the same institute where Dr. Shaw formerly taught; she looked the holographic reproduction of a painting in the Isle of Skye, discovered by Shaw and Holloway in 2089.

The site had been discovered by geologists while exploring the mountains known as _The Storr_ , looking for new deposits of zeolite. In a crevasse, formed by an ancient landslip, the geologists discovered a small cave littered with Mesolithic artifacts. As conservation acts dictated, they called the institute and Dr. Shaw and Holloway were sent, uncovering a pattern they have been chasing after all over the world. It was their last discovery before their expedition financed by Weyland himself ten years ago.

Since her first day in University, Eli was fascinated by Shaw's thesis about an alien race which had influenced the development of human civilization, which almost immediately ruined the academic credibility of the archeologist. In Eli's opinion, Shaw could've been right, but she had omitted stellar drift in the map and for that reason, she believed Shaw and the Prometheus expedition were searching in the wrong place. Now, following her own theories, she was looking for the real place placed in that map, but her investigation had stalled as more clues had not been discovered.

-"I know that stellar drift had to have modified the pattern, but the stars in the painting and the carving had the same size, nothing that identifies a particular object, a name, something." Eli wondered out loud, admiring the painting.

The pattern indeed was formed by six spheres or circles in a very specific disposition. All had the same size, but the ones in the Mayan stele and the Assyrian tablet clearly represented stars as they were five point stars and tiny suns respectively, the ones in the Isle of Skye were simple circles, as the rest of the other findings. If they were planets, they would have some kind of marking representing orbits, but there was none. The same for constellation patterns, there wasn't lines connecting the objects or any indication of different sizes in the stars. Even the golden disk on the Voyager probe back in 1979 had markings indicating pulsar stars, magnitude and distance, and the Solar system planets had size scale and even Saturn showed its rings. These "maps" had nothing, just six objects.

-"Eli, you're here. I was looking for you." The door opened and a man on his mid-twenties, wearing a turban entered the room.

-"What happened, Nirajit?" Eli asked her fellow student, looking away from the hologram.

Nirajit Rashid was two years younger than Eli and was an expert on Ancient Hindi astronomy; born an Indian Muslim he had studied at the Delhi Institute and was part of the team who revised Professor Nilesh Nilkanth's thesis about the date the Kurukshetra war depicted in the Hindu poem _Mahabharata_ by the position of the stars, and agreed that occurred sometime between 11,091 BCE and 4508 BCE, in the late Neolithic.

-"There's been a new discovery, near the coast of the Black sea in Iranistan." He said, while pulling an envelope.

-"What is it about?" she continued. Archaeo-astronomy depended from field discoveries as much as space telescopes, satellites and computer modeling, things she'd has already access.

-"An ancient temple, It has features of ancient Greek, Assyrian and Indo civilizations, possible proto Indo-European." Nirajit answered, reading the document inside the envelope "They want us to examine it."

-"Who? Why us? We are archaeo-astronomers, not classic archeologists" She answered, intrigued.

-"The memorandum was sent by Professor Andrew Woods. He parted to a construction site at Mount Ebrus in the Caucasus about two days ago; he mentions the temple had a mural that looks like a stellar map. The paper had Weyland-Yutani Corp logo on it."

Professor Andrew Woods was one of the most renowned scientists in archaeology and linguistics at the Wellington Institute. His expertise area was Proto Indo-European, a civilization thought to be the ancestor of all Europe and Indo valley civilization whose recorded language hadn't been found yet, only inferred. Eli wondered why Professor Woods needs them.

-"What kind of map?" Eli's expression changed immediately.

-"Dr. Woods mention similitudes with the Dendera zodiac, with some differences. Something about a Rosetta stone" Dr. Rashid responded.

-"It might be another clue to Shaw's theory" She thought, but quickly she discarded the idea "Do you know something about who the temple is dedicated to?" Eli asked her assistant.

-"The team at the site had found some interesting markings and murals." Rashid informed, still reading the memo, "Professor Woods described symbols associated with Hermes, Zeus and the name of Prometheus in one of the carvings."

-"Well, we need to get there as soon as is possible. No team until we've assessed the situation. I'll gesture the passports and travel expenses with the finance department."

-"I will get us a transport to the area, Eli." Nirajit headed for the exit.

A day later, Monygham and Rashid were in a car bound to Heathrow aerospace-port.

\- o –

Eli Monygham's field diary

September 21st, 2105

I'm excited by the new discovery. I wondered if the map would be like those discovered by Dr. Shaw around the world. Since the first time I heard her theory I had doubts about the validity of her statements. The pattern was always the same, no matter if the depictions were separated by thousands of years. The stars are always in movement, what we see in the sky today isn't the same as thousand years ago. Anyway, I'm thrilled about this; Professor Andrew Woods is one of the most respected archaeologists and if he needs our help, then it must be something really big.

\- o –

 **September 23rd, 2105. Sukhumi, Iranistan, former Republic of Georgia.**

The space plane descended in the large pad of the Ankara-Esenboga airport, in the former Turkey, now part of the Iranistan Republic, formed by Azerbaijan, Georgia, Armenia, Iran and Turkey. The countries had combined their economies and now exported the necessary minerals for the construction of colony ships by the European Union and United Americas.

Eli and Nirajit had flown in a commercial space-plane from London to Ankara, from where took a small cargo transport to the city of Sukhumi just where the Caucasus Mountains meet the Black Sea coast. When they arrived at the city, Eli inhaled the temperate air, a slightly warmer than Suffolk's.

-"We're here, at Sukhumi, not far away from the site." Nirajit commented. "I think the temple is on the west slope of Mount Ebrus." The snowcapped volcano –the tallest mountain in Europe –was visible from the city.

-"Mmm interesting, this city and Mount Ebrus are in some way related to the myth of Prometheus and the Theft of Fire." Eli had investigated about Prometheus myth over the past two days, she had only notions but in order to examine the temple, she needed more than a 101 class.

The travel to the ruins' site took them about one hour in a cargo transport, a four engine VTOL airplane belonging to new merged Weyland-Yutani Company; the aircraft descended in a pad besides the construction camp, consisting on a series of modular prefabricated buildings which served as housing, kitchen, warehouse, garage and communications center, it had an antenna and a small clinic.

Eli felt the snow she'd stepped as soon as she left the pad, they were at high altitude and she wondered why someone would build a road this high in a volcano.

-"Ms. Monygham, you made it!" A voice called her, a well-built man in his forties with a thick moustache and Ukrainian accent was coming towards them "Vasily Petrovich, Construction Foreman. Come, you didn't want to stay in the snow all day."

-"Elisabeth Monygham, and this is Nirajit Rashid." Eli introduced herself and her companion "If you don't mind, we want to examine the site now, while we still have sunlight."

-"Very well" Petrovich said "Let your baggage here, someone will take it to your module. The temple is over here" and he walked towards the steep hundred meters away.

The Temple was partially buried in one of the mountain slopes. The temple was discovered when a workers team were building a new road. When they detonated explosives in the rock, part of the temple entrance was uncovered. The glacier and trees had prevented from being detected previously by satellite images. Eli had obtained some images with LIDAR (Laser Imaging Detection and Ranging) back at the institute, but the radar had not been able to pass the layer of basalt in which the temple had been excavated.

-"Entrance is over there" Petrovich pointed "The map is at the end of the hallway. Professor Woods are already there. Woods is the archaeologist assigned by Weyland-Yutani Corporation to oversee this road construction site as part of preservation of historical monuments Act, as you know W-Y is the company building the road communicating their mines in the Caucasus with the seaport." The construction foreman told them.

-"Just follow the lights. I'll be here, got a job to do, you'll be fine" Petrovich said.

A group of workers had cordoned the area and now were cleaning up rubble left by the blast and Petrovich joined them. Nirajit and Eli climbed to the entrance, a generator provided energy to the LED lights installed in the temple's main hallway.

-"It seems Wey-Yu influence is growing." Nirajit pointed.

-"Soon they will own everything." Eli responded sarcastically.

After Peter Weyland died and his daughter Meredith Vickers disappeared, the company was bought by Hideo Yutani and now the vast corporation was known as Weyland-Yutani, or W-Y for short, with an array of subsidiaries ranging from pharmaceutical to weapons.

They followed the cable and soon the hallway widened and Eli saw numerous carvings and bas-reliefs on the walls.

-"This is amazing!" She exclaimed.

They reached the end of the hallway, there a man in his early fifties, examined the roof. Andrew Woods resembled those archeologists from the movies, grey beard, thick circular glasses, leather jacket and a felt hat. Nothing to do with the jovial image that Charlie Holloway or Elizabeth Shaw transmitted. Eli knew that despite his retro appearance, the man was one of the most respected researchers at the institute. He turned when he realized more people had arrived and promptly greeted them.

-"Ah, Ms. Monygham and Mr. Rashid, welcome to the find of the century." Said the man with his arms extended like as if he were a master of ceremonies.

-"Thank you, Professor Woods; It's nice to see you again. You need us to take a look onto a map, please, can you show us?" Eli asked. The man smiled.

-"I haven't seen that kind of eager enthusiasm since I had taken my grandson to one of my expeditions. You're right below it, Doctor." The professor said and pointed the roof, and Eli and Nirajit looked up and dropped their jaws in awe.

The vaulted ceiling had a detailed paint of a star map like that of Dendera complex in Egypt, but instead of the Egyptian representations of constellations, the map showed the star configurations joined by lines, and each celestial body had inscriptions in various sets of markings. Eli could identify some Greek, cuneiform and Sanskrit symbols and an unknown language. She inferred the markings were a proto Indo-European language, originated on late Neolithic-Early Copper age somewhere near this region. As with the Dendera map, it was also centered on Alpha Lyrae, the star Vega.

-"The map is centered on Vega, in Lyra constellation. But, look at the configuration, it's slightly different than today. That's the stellar drift, Vega is the closest star to Earth in Lyre so its relative position changed more than the others, but I think this map is how the sky looked when Vega was the pole star almost 12,000 B.C." Eli explained.

-"Late Neolithic" Andrew Woods said. "That matched with the proposed appearance of the Indo-European language and with the rise of agriculture and domestication, a great jump for mankind" referring Neil Armstrong famous phrase.

Professor Woods pulled out a little device from his bag, a four rotor drone. The tiny aircraft floated and began mapping the interior.

-"I prefer this drones over those holographic PUPs, high resolution cameras record every detail" he commented "I want a virtual reality map of the interior of the temple to study this markings. It's a Rosetta stone, a translator."

As the drone mapped the place, Eli observed every detail on the painting. The first thing she had noticed was Lira constellation had the same pattern she had observed on Shaw's thesis, which enforced her idea about how Shaw had been wrong about the place the star map indicated.

-"Professor, are you familiar with Dr. Shaw's theory of the engineers?" Eli asked the man.

-"I'm afraid I'm not, my specialty is proto Indo-European culture and I required for the company when they had discovered the Temple. When I saw the map I realized I needed an expert and I called the Institute."

-"Doctors Shaw and Holloway had a theory about how an extraterrestrial race they called Engineers had been improving human civilization since at least 35,000 years ago. They found various artifacts around the globe pointing to a star and convinced Sir. Peter Weyland himself to fund an expedition to said star. I'd analyzed their findings and I'm convinced whoever made those carvings, paintings and stone steles didn't account for stellar drift. But this map here, it's too precise to be made by early known civilizations… Look, stars are different, and they have names, even the M57 nebula is represented in Lira, that Eye symbol between Al-Sulhafat and Al-Shilyak, it's only observable by telescope, impossible to see with the naked eye." Eli exposed her analysis.

-"An excellent analysis, Ms. Monygham" the Professor approved. "That would explain the rest of the murals and carvings I already analyzed before your arrival. Come, I'll show you."

\- o -

The three walked back to the great hallway, the Professor guided them to one bas-relief at the far left end. Images there had a Greco-Roman style but with elements of Assyrian aesthetics.

-"I assume you had heard the myth of Prometheus." Woods told them.

-"For what I had learned, Prometheus was the Titan who stole the fire from Zeus and gave it to men. An act for he was chained to a mountain somewhere on this range." Eli answered.

-"Prometheus had previously tricked him in Mekone, by making him chose the inedible parts part of an ox and keeping the edibles for humans in a sacrifice, so Zeus vented his anger on the humans by keeping the fire from them." Woods explained "Prometheus was chained to this mountain, Mount Ebrus, where an eagle –or vulture –would eat his liver eternally. That's the account written by Hesiod. But here we have a different version of that myth. I think this temple is placed on the exact spot where the Titan was chained." The Professor continued. "Here is what I believe is the beginning. This inscription Εγώ, ο προμηθέας τιτάν, έγραψα αυτό το λογαριασμό... roughly translates as: I, the Titan Prometheus, wrote this account of…"

The mural showed four stylized human figures, two males and two females, hunting large animals: a mammoth, an elk with large antlers, possibly a Megaloceros, and others. Then two giant humanoid figures came and talked with the two humans. Then one couple kept oxen inside a fence and the other was harvesting in a wheat field. Text in the ancient language explained each of the scenes.

-"This scene clearly represents the pass from a hunter-gatherer tribe to a farming community, the large humanoid teaches the humans agriculture and cattle breeding. The name for the giant is Τιτάν Προμηθεύς, Titan Prometheus, which literally means "The Giant who thinks ahead". The ability to keep cattle and seed wheat is a way of fore thinking, assuring food at long term" Eli ventured. Woods approved by a nod of his head.

-"That matches Hesiod account: ' _and they had all good things; for the fruitful earth unforced bare them fruit abundantly and without stint_ ', After mankind had learn farming, they didn't have to live day by day anymore." Woods quoted.

-"The next panel is incomplete." Eli pointed the flashlight to the next mural.

The paintings in the next wall represented a city or village, and one giant figure speaking to the two couples. The humans bring part of their food and placed in an altar before the giant, he then chose one of the piles. Half of the wall had collapsed long ago, maybe due to volcanic activity on the now dormant volcano.

-"So, the giant here is different from the teacher. He represents Ζεύς, or θεός, which means God, demanding his share. The name of the village here: ΣIkuώv, is the ancient Greek name of the city of Sukhumi. It means Sicyon, one of the names of Mikone where Prometheus tricked Zeus according to the myth." Woods explained.

-"Let's continue." Eli passed to the next wall, in bas-relief.

-"This wall tells the consequences of the trick." Woods pointed to the picture of one of the giants giving a woman what seems to be a Jar from atop a mountain and sending her to the city accompanied by other giant. "This is Πανδώρα, Pandora which means 'All gifted', sent to Earth with a jar, not a box, containing all the evils."

-"Who is the other giant? The name is missing." Nirajit asked.

The figurine representing the giant who escorted Pandora lacked the inscription. The only other glyphs were a double letter phi φ, one over other, crowned by a big U

-"This is the symbol of the god Hermes, it's a stylized _Caduceus_ , two serpents wrapped around a staff, and the big U is a Lyre, also related to the god. Zeus ordered Hermes to escort Pandora to Prometheus' brother, Epimetheus." Woods continued explaining the glyphs. "To this point, the story matched, there's nothing new here."

-"Let's see the last panel; it seems it's a detailed description of the jar." Eli walked to the last set of carvings, the two men followed her.

The final carvings were beautiful sculpted in the basalt stone of the temple. The others were mere painted bas-reliefs in limestone slates similar to Egyptian and Assyrian temples, but these reminded Eli of the temples of Angkor and India.

At the base of the sculpture was that of the jar, standing up over a low platform or altar. It had cuneiform scripture carved on the exterior and text written to the right. The next was the same symbols from the god Hermes, the caduceus and the Lyre, but more detailed.

The caduceus standing up right below the lyre, which itself was odd, made up of dark grey slate, standing up as Hathor's horns, but bulbous ends. Left end almost as a hammerhead. Each side of the _Caduceus_ were humanoid monstrous creatures carved in white travertine, skeletal biped bodies with long scorpion-like tails, on their backs they had four protruding spikes similar to short triangular wings. The head were long and pointing upwards and have no eyes. Its hands and feet had claws.

-"What are those?" Nirajit asked, clearly disgusted. Professor Woods examined the inscription and roughly translated it.

-"The gift from the gods must not be accepted, so they bring only damnation. Phytos, I mean the jar, contains demons and disease. Here are some of the names of those evils." Woods read.

-"It's describing Pandora's jar and its contents" Eli pointed.

-"Yes, look here. The symbol of the _Caduceus_ in astrology is Mercury, which in turn is the roman equivalent of Hermes, also the element of the same name: _Hydrargyrum_ , or liquid silver." Woods continued "I think this giant identified the liquid inside the jar, look, it says the liquid vaporized and that's what killed the inhabitants of the village."

-"The jar was some kind of chemical weapon?" Rashid asked.

-"Some kind of liquid metal or metallic appearance chemical compound, which vaporized was deadly." Woods continued reading "They believed these _aqrabuamelu_ , or scorpion men they mentioned are from…" He pointed at a word in the bass-relief " _Kurnugr_ , the Acadian land of darkness also known as _Irkalla_. Other name spoken here is _Gallu_ , 'those who drag their victims underground' and 'had poison instead of blood'. Sounds like a poetic way to say this weapon kills by poisoning the blood. Blood poisoning by mercury is not a very nice way to die."

-"And these beasts…?" Nirajit asked "These _Gallu_ , why are they eyeless?"

-"It's possible –I'm only interpreting this –they have no eyes because whatever the jar contained makes no distinction. It kills indiscriminately, no matter if you're rich or poor, you get the point?" Woods explained.

-"It sounds terrible, indeed." Eli concluded. "So, Prometheus tried to alert his brother, and the village about a weapon about to be unleashed against them."

-"Yes, they avoided the disaster not without some casualties, according to the account," Eli said "But what happened to Prometheus? Is he really chained to the mountain?"

-"We don't know, this is only the entrance of the Temple, what we call an Atrium, Seismic prospection had shown the gallery extends further. We'll need some drilling equipment to remove part of the collapsed rock. I already have requisitioned it." Woods told them, "Come, we'll back to the camp."

\- o -

Eli Monygham's field diary

September 23rd, 2105

As I suspected, Shaw omitted stellar drift on her theories, this temple has a map representing the sky as seen at the end of Neolithic, and carvings tell the story of Prometheus, who taught mankind the use of "fire", actually written language and agriculture. But, also, this enraged Zeus, according to the myth, had to do something about a Bouphonia, a festival in which an ox is sacrificed. Zeus then decided to send all the evils and diseased contained in a jar to punish mankind. Carvings called these evils as _Aqrabuamelu_ and _Gallu_ , demons from _Irkalla_ , or underworld.

The _Aqrabuamelu_ or Scorpion men are represented as humanoid bodies with claws and long tail, Woods theorizes the lack of eyes must be a depiction of the indiscriminate nature of the weapon. Caduceus symbol of mercury or Hydrargyrum "liquid silver" seems to indicate the jars contained some kind of liquid which vaporized, just as a modern chemical warhead.

\- o -


	3. Chapter 2: The Tomb

**CHAPTER 2: THE TOMB.**

 **September 24th, 2105. Mount Ebrus, Iranistan Republic.**

Back at the modular buildings, Eli and Rashid were guided towards their rooms. Petrovich had told them the equipment will be ready in the morning.

At morning they reunited with Andrew Woods at the mess hall. Vasili Petrovich and others were playing cards in the next table.

-"So, Dr. Woods, You said your specialty is Proto Indo-European civilization, can you explain us more about it? Why did you say that map is a Rosetta stone?" Eli opened conversation.

-"Oh yes, Dear. Every culture in Europe and Asia seems to derivate from an ancient common culture. Egyptian, Assyrian, Mesopotamian, Greek, Easter Europe and Hindu valley civilization are believed to have their roots in what is called Proto Indo-European –PIE –Culture." Woods explained them "Tracking the origin of language is like investigating DNA phylogeny, more ancient, more in common two languages have. But no one had found an example of written PIE language, the closest thing to it is the Schleicher's fable"

-"Got it" she acknowledged.

-"The fable is a reconstructed PIE version based on Sanskrit, one of the more ancient languages in existence, I can pronounced it but without any written example I'm afraid I'll not be able to read it." Woods admitted "But here, we have inscriptions made on various languages in conjunction with an unknown one, possibly PIE due to its similarity to Sanskrit symbols."

-"So, reading on Greek and Sanskrit we can understand the unknown language… just as the Rosetta stone did for Greek and hieroglyphs" Nirajit intervened.

-"Exactly!" Woods exclaimed, closing one eye and lifting a thumb.

-"The excavation equipment is here, Dr. Woods. We are ready as soon as you are." Petrovich interrupted them. Woods had asked for loaders which would clear the rock collapse blocking the main access. They finished their breakfast and were ready.

The sound of the exo-suits echoed all over the Atrium. Rock fragments and dust were cleared the corridor's entrance to the Temple complex. Then the workers moved the machines backwards. A four meter diameter hole in the wall opened like a dark mouth ready to swallow any being not so cautious to enter there.

The three Scientists were ready; they have powerful flashlights and other equipment inside their backpacks. Andrew Woods entered the cave, followed by Eli, Nirajit and the tiny drone.

-"As you suspected, the room with the murals and the map were only the entrance." Eli commented, sweeping the flashlight sideways.

-"It seems, this place is huge." Woods added. "The hallway is leading us right into the mountain."

They were in a wide, vaulted hallway, but unlike the entrance, style didn't match any style known. The pillars and arches holding the ceiling almost looked organic, like the ribs of a big animal. There were few and scarce inscriptions on the walls. But at the far end a strange bluish light glowed. They kept walking towards that place.

Reaching the light source, they soon found themselves in what used to be a terrace, a circular stone platform carved in the rock of the mountain. Around them, there was ice, clear blue colored ice part of the glacier which covered the mountain. The sunlight penetrated the ice and was the source of the bluish glow.

-"What is this place?" Nirajit asked "Obviously was located at the exterior of the mountain and was covered by the glacier."

-"Oh my-" Eli's exclamation was cut short, she was watching something at the side of the platform in the mountain side.

-"Is it possible he's-?" Woods also was speechless.

In the rock wall, there was a giant humanoid corpse, chained to the mountain by thick, metal chains. The corpse was almost naked, only a loincloth covering its lower torso, it was hanging by its arms, looking downwards, but the most terrifying feature was an opening on its belly, as if someone –or something –had disemboweled him, leaving a trace of blue blood over the platform.

-"Is he the Titan Prometheus?" Nirajit asked, with his mouth opened in awe. "The giant who thinks ahead?"

-"I think he is, chained to Mount Ebrus, punished by an eagle which ate his liver." Woods responded, pointing to the huge wound.

Eli looked up and saw the ice, she imagined the eagle descending towards the chained Titan and tearing apart his liver, the Titan screaming while the bird swallowed his organ. She shuddered.

She was watching the giant's corpse. The Titan was a well-built specimen, tall, muscular, bald and his skin was white, Eli thought on the marble statue of _Discobolus_. A close examination revealed a prominent supraciliary arch, a Greek nose and blue tongue in a mouth opened in agony. Blood stains on the frozen platform were also dark blue.

-"I thought the representation of the gods as giants were not something literal, just a figurative denotation of greatness." Eli said. "Also, the white color and blue blood as a symbol of divinity and royalty, nor their actual skin color"

-"Some cultures associated albinism as a sign of the gods." Woods responded.

Eli admired the corpse, she was sure Shaw would be absolutely amazed. This discovery would have vindicated the scientist in the sense a more advanced race helped humans to develop civilization. But only a DNA test would clarify if they are alien or just tall hominids.

-"We need a tissue sample" Eli said "DNA testing"

-"Good idea" Woods had approached the corpse and took a sample of congealed blood from the giant's belly. "There's something here, more inscriptions." He said, seeing around.

Eli and Nirajit approached the place. On the mountain rock, there were inscriptions in characters similar to Sanskrit, possible Proto Indo-European and their translations on Sanskrit. Woods examined it and tried to translate the text.

-"Obviously this was made by whoever had chained the Titan here; symbols are the same as the ones at the entrance." He said. "The other is Sanskrit"

-"What did it says?" Eli asked.

-"It says: This giant opposed the lord's commandment and was punished not only by having his body desecrated, but by witness the utterly destruction of those who he wanted to protect. Kind of-" Woods quoted the text.

-"Witnessing?" Eli asked, "What kind of destruction the prisoner witnessed from here at the highs of a mountain."

Nirajit pulled a GPS from his backpack, the device of the size of a smartphone was designed for mapping using global positioning system and had a digital compass integrated, it could be set in magnetic, geographic or any other celestial pole, ideal for exploration in other planets.

-"We're located at the west side of Mount Ebrus" Nirajit pointed the device towards the crevice in the mountain covered in ice. "And according to the compass, the only thing that can be seen from here is Sukhumi and the Black Sea."

\- o –

-"Look, there's more over here" Dr. Woods pointed.

Covered by the ice and snow, another set of inscriptions in ancient Sanskrit was carved in the rock. Andrew Woods examined it and again, he translated to Eli and Nirajit.

-"There are some words I can recognize" Woods said.

-"What did it say?" Eli asked.

-"There's a word here, _Hánti_ , Death, associated word _Mamsám_ , Meat. These two, _Pasús_ and _Vés_ , mean Cattle or animals, and birds. _Rksas_? Bear or beast, Could be a contracted form of _Rakshasa_ , some kind of demon." Woods explained some of the symbols trying to make sense of the text. "It says father, _Pitá_ , sent an Arrow, _sarús_ , to cleanse all, _Mársti vísve_. Grammar is difficult but the idea is pretty clear."

-" _And all flesh died that moved on the earth, birds, livestock, beasts, all swarming creatures that swarm on the earth, and all mankind._ " Eli quoted "The book of Genesis 7:21."

-"Well done, Ms. Monygham." Professor Woods congratulated her.

-"Well, Dr. Shaw was a deeply religious person." She said "She quoted Genesis from time to time on her works."

-"Are you saying the tragedy the Titan was obliged to see was the Deluge?" Nirajit asked.

-"Well, in the Greek Myth, Zeus wanted to exterminate mankind, and sent a flood in which all animals died, except Deucalion and his wife Pyrra, which in turn were descendants of Prometheus and Epimetheus and Pandora respectively." Woods responded.

-"I guess Zeus thought the liver being ripped by a vulture is not enough suffering, and wanted the Titan to witness the destruction of the village by his weapon of mass destruction, whatever Pandora's box is" Eli concluded.

On that moment, the ice walls shuddered and immediately after they heard the rumble of engines over the mountain, a transport approached. One of Petrovich's men came through the hallway and called them.

-"Professor, please came back outside. We have visitors." He said.

-"Who's it?" Woods asked.

They walked back to the main entrance, Eli closed his eyes at the bright sunlight reflected in the mountain' snow. A transport ship with the Weyland-Yutani logo like the one had brought them there landed in the pad north of the camp. The aft ramp opened and men descended from the craft. The trio approached to the man who seemed to be in charge. A tall Russian man wearing a grey jumpsuit with the intertwined W-Y letters and reflective Eagle eyes glasses.

-"Hello, I'm Professor Andrew Woo-" Woods was interrupted as he offered the hand.

-"From now, this area is restricted. No one outside our special team is allowed inside the temple." The man informed. He carried a stainless steel suitcase with a logo Eli couldn't identify: A telescope pointing to a star and the word STARGAZER below it.

-"Who are you?" Woods asked.

-"I'm Dr. Konrad Volkov, Weyland-Yutani R&D Division." He answered, taking off his glasses. The man's cold eyes make Eli doubt, and he looked more a spy or soldier than a scientist.

-"This is an important discovery. There are evidence of a previously unknown written language, this place must be studied and preserved." Professor Woods alleged. "I was hired by W-Y to investigate the place, and my colleagues, Ms. Monygham and Mr. Rashid are here to help me."

-"Not anymore, I suggest you pack your gear and leave this to us." The man said, pulling a folder from his suitcase, and extending them checks. "Here is your payment and the transport is there, it will take you to Sukhumi."

Eli was about to protest but saw the nearest man reach something under his coat; she recognized the muzzle of an assault rifle. Eli elbowed Nirajit and he saw it too. Reluctantly they accepted the checks, Woods did the same. The three walked out the hallway towards the transport.

\- o –

Eli Monygham's field diary

September 24th, 2105

This is outrageous! just when we discovered the find of the century, some corporate arsehole and his band of mercenaries shown their noses! He said he's a scientist but the assault rifles his men were carrying told me they are something else. They "politely" had paid and escorted us back to Sukhumi.

We found not only artifacts and carvings; we had found an actual "Engineer" as Shaw called them. I prefer the term "Titan," but not just one Titan but apparently this was the Prometheus from the myth, the very one who taught mankind civilization! Here's a description: Eight feet tall, pale white skin, blue eyes and tongue, prominent supracilliary arch, Greek type nose. He was chained at the mountain and had a huge wound on his abdomen. Blood is dark blue in color and possibly based on Hemocyanine or Copper. DNA tests are pending.

\- o –

 **September 24th, 2105. Sukhumi, Iranistan Republic.**

The transport took them all, even the construction team to the coastal city. Now the sun still was high over the mountains and the glacier shone in white color. Eli was disappointed, wondering how the find of the Century had slipped out of their hands, but there was nothing she could do.

They had received their paychecks and Sukhumi was a coastal resort, their tickets back to London were scheduled within two days, the flight back to Ankara and London parted in the morning, so she had a few hours to tour the old city market before returning to the Institute.

The city was full of story, ranging from the Greeks and Roman empires to the Soviet Socialist Republics during the cold war, passing through the Ottoman Empire and Sassanid Turks. Eli surely will find something interesting there in which occupy her mind.

Walking through the waterfront, looking for a place where she could buy some local _chacha_ , a local, homebrewed pomace brandy, Eli came into an old looking hostel. There were few people, she sat at the hostel's bar counter and the barmaid approached. A girl on his mid-twenties, she had the typical Georgian looks, brunette, cinnamon skin and profound olive eyes, but the thing which called Eli's attention more than her looks was the necklace the girl was wearing.

-"What can I serve you?" the girl said in English.

-"A _chacha_ please" Eli responded "I'm Eli. I noticed your necklace, where did you found it?" She asked.

-"Hi, It was a gift from my father. His grandfather found it at the bottom of the sea." The girl said, "He found some things when fishing."

-"Can I see it?"

-"Yes, but it's not for sale, OK?" The girl said, taking the medallion and showing it to Eli so she could see it better, Eli took it and examined it closely.

The necklace was made from bronze, the style was Mycenae or ancient Greek, but the thing had attracted Eli's attention were symbols consistent with the writing in the Tomb. Proto Indo-European.

 **अभिजीत**

-"You said your father found more things, what kind of things?" Eli asked, intrigued.

-"My great grandfather, yes; Pottery, jars and things like that. You want to see them they're exhibited in my father's office." The girl said. "He's the owner, but do not let anyone get in there unless he invite them or paid." She shot Eli a mischievous smile.

-"Oh right, you win…" Eli accepted and waited for the girl's name.

-"Bedisa" The girl said. "Come, over here Eli."

She gave Bedisa the money and followed the girl inside the hostel until they reached the manager's office. The girl guided her to a cabinet, inside there were some items. But the most interesting thing was a broken steatite vessel with carvings on its exterior. Some of the symbols seemed cuneiform, exactly as the representation of the Pandora's jar inside the temple.

-"This is amazing. Did you mind if I take some photos?" She said, pulling her smartphone device.

-"That will cost you extra, you know?" the girl said.

-"Deal, In fact, I'd really wish to buy all this. Tell your father he only had to say a number" Eli responded, determined not to let go this opportunity. "I need to make a call."

Bedisa hesitated, wondering if the woman in front of her was crazy. Those objects were on her family for almost six generations but to her they were only trinkets with a sentimental value, she could not understand the value they could have for that English woman talking on her phone that looked like a girl who has been told she can choose anything she wants in a toy store.

An hour later, Rashid and Professor Woods were at the store examining the urn. It turned out that Bedisa's father was a man who enjoy to tell stories, he told them how his grandfather –who was a fisherman –was on his boat near the coast of the city, and after a day without catching fish, the net got entangled in the sediment, after a few minutes the net unraveled and what was his surprise to see that it brought with it the steatite vessels. Unable to sell them on the black market, the old man kept them at home.

Other explorers had searched the Black Sea looking for ancient submerged villages. The discovery of villages, ports and ships by Robert Ballard in early 21st century proved his theory about the Deluge –the Biblical flood –being the filling of the Black Sea basin at the end of the ice age.

They started the usual negotiation, all while they smoked and drank the house's chacha. Rashid was excused from drinking only because he was Muslim. They have agreed to pay Bedisa's father well for the collection. The man was more than happy.

-"Well, these carvings matched those of the Temple. We need to run tests on the object, carbon dating, spectrometry, and electronic microscopy. We need to determinate age and precedence." Woods told Eli and Nirajit.

-"The institute's Geology and Mineralogy Lab is available. I'm in good terms with Ezra, who is in charge." Eli suggested.

-"Well, we pack this up and flew to Suffolk as soon as possible." Woods said, and turned to Bedisa, "As for you, miss. You have honored your name. Bedisa, ' _Who was fated to be here_ '"

\- o –

Eli Monygham's field diary

September 24th, 2105

We got lucky! This is gonna sound like some kind of joke but I walked into a bar wanting a bottle of "Chacha", the local whiskey and stumbled upon this girl: Bedisa. She had a strange pendant with a Proto Indo-European symbol on it, when asked her about it; she said her great grandfather found some interesting artifacts on the sea bottom. She agreed to show them for a price, I paid her without hesitation.

The inscription on the medallion was अभिजीत which according to Woods, means "Abhijit" or victorious. But the real prize was the artifacts on the collection, an exact copy of the urn represented in the Temple, carved in Steatite or soapstone, it was broken but enough for a spectrographic and mineralogical analysis. We decide to buy the artifacts and bring them to the Institute. I've already sent a message to Ezra of the Geology and Mineralogy lab.

\- o –

 **September 25th, 2105. Geology and Mineralogy Laboratory of Wellington Institute. Suffolk, UK/EU**

The machine emitted a series of beeps as it finished the analysis. The screen shown a magnified view of the surface of the jar, mostly composed by very fine grains of white-grey talc and a fewer, sand sized grains of an emerald green mineral.

-"What we are looking is a five thousand magnification of the steatite jar. As we suspected the grey material is talc, hydrated magnesium silicate, but these little crystals are some kind of vitrification. Let's see." Ezra, an African looking man who was in charge of the Institute's Mineralogy and Geology lab said.

Doctors Monygham, Rashid and Woods were in the lab analyzing the vessel purchased in Sukhumi, trying to identify its composition and age. Ezra selected the area occupied by the tiny crystals and ran a spectrographic analysis. Soon the blue screen showed the results.

-"The mineral is Enstatite, a magnesium silicate, product of heating steatite up to 1200 Celsius degrees." Ezra informed them. "Crystals are growing inside the talc, not part of the jar's content."

-"That means the jar was affected by heat, high enough to recrystallize the talc." Woods guessed. He was no geologist, but certainly was smart.

Eli was thinking the same thing but had restrained herself to tell anything in front of Ezra. If Pandora's jar was some kind of chemical weapon which vaporized, heat means the jar exploded in order to vaporize the liquid inside, just like a modern chemical warhead.

-"What about the jar's age? Could you make an estimate, Ezra?" Eli asked.

-"Scattered zircon crystals contain certain amount of uranium inside, this gives us…" he typed on the machine. "Well, it can't be. The age on crystals inside the soapstone matrix indicate it is few millions years old, that's normal because the oldest rocks are always metamorphic, but the age for the recrystallization is almost 30 thousand years. Humans didn't developed pottery until much later." Ezra explained.

-"No, It's not. Well, at least, a culture as sophisticated to make this class of carvings and pottery, not to say metal working" Eli said.

The revelation shocked the scientists; all evidence matched what was written on the Tomb's walls. The giants have not only visited Earth and kick started the Proto Indo-European civilization but some faction of them had attempted to destroy it with weapons of mass destruction.

-"Ezra, we need a test for provenance." Eli told him.

-"I'm already searching in the current databases. I'll call you when I have the results." Ezra replied.

\- o –

They were at the Institute's park; the analysis would take one or two hours. Eli was thinking about Elizabeth Shaw's thesis. The Doctor always was optimistic about whom she called "Engineers"; she interpreted the star map as an invitation. For her, the act of creation involved love for the things –or beings –created. But the clues at the temple told a very different story, the "gods" were also ruthless, willing to destroy their creations with weapons of mass destruction, which made Eli think if they –humans –weren't better without those "gods"

-"What do you think, Eli?" Woods question took her out of her thoughts.

-"I was thinking about the tomb. It was made as a warning about what the gods were capable of, but Shaw always saw them as an invitation, and maybe that's the reason she and the Prometheus never returned." Eli said.

-"But you were sure Dr. Shaw was wrong about the place the star map indicated" Rashid told her.

-"I could be wrong, too" Eli replied. "The point is. If there is an advanced civilization of potentially hostile beings with weapons of mass destruction, it's only a matter of time before the colonization efforts found them."

They fell silent. Since the development of faster than light drive, humanity had been expanded out from the sol system into the stars. There were approximately 52 stars between 16 light years from Earth, most of which had planets, and there was a plan to colonize those even farther.

The most ambitious of all was the recently launched colony ship USCSS _Covenant_ , currently on its ten years travel to Origae-6, a distant planet about 239 light years from Earth. It was the star project of the recently formed company Weyland-Yutani and the hopes and illusions of more than two thousands colonists seeking a new life in the universe.

A moment later, Eli, Nirajit Rashid and Andrew Woods were back at the lab. Ezra had the results about provenance of the minerals. The computer screen showed a graph with the amount of elements, and another with the possible match.

-"It seems we have a match on the mineral Enstatite." Ezra told them "And it's not from Earth"

-"What?!" Eli exclaimed "Are you sure?"

-"The artifact is from the late Neolithic, possible early bronze age." Woods told the Lab technician. They had omitted the markings and the urn was possible related to an extraterrestrial civilization.

-"Specifically this mineral the vessel is made of, have a 96% match with spectrographic data from the star Vega." Ezra explained. "Enstatite is one of the few minerals detected around other systems, and Vega is a star with a lot of debris around it. The vase could have been made with a meteor stone."

-"Vega? Mmmm. Sent the report to my personal terminal in the lab, Ezra. We'll analyze the data there." Eli didn't want to discuss anything more in front of the man.

-"Yes, Ms. Monygham" He responded.

A few moments later, they received the file and Eli put it on the screen. As Ezra had said, the mineral matched that on the dust ring around the star.

-"Oh right, the material definitely comes from Alpha Lyrae. But what's it's relation with Prometheus myth?" Woods asked.

Eli turned off the lights and typed on the computer, the room was filled with the holographic image of the night sky. Eli zoomed on the star Vega.

-"Vega. Latin name Alpha Lyrae, Gliese catalog Gl 721, the brightest star in the sky. It was the pole star sometimes twelve thousand years ago. It's located in the Lira constellation and is one of the summer triangle vertexes, along with Alpha Aquilae and Alpha Cygni." Eli explained "Wait, that's it! Lira is also called _Vultur cadens_ , represented by a descending Vulture."

-"You mean the vulture which ate Prometheus' liver?" Nirajit asked.

-"More than that" Eli continued "In Astro-Archaeology, _Vultur cadens_ , the descending vulture is a symbol of Zeus, but Cygnus or the Swan is another form Zeus took when descending to Earth, most specifically when seducing Leda; and Aquila is the eagle who holds Zeus' thunderbolts. The three birds form the Summer Triangle"

-"Plot the sky as it was when the tomb was built" Woods said "Then, interpolate it with my map of the tomb, I think I have an idea that it was showing above the crevasse where the body was."

Eli typed a few commands in the computer and showed the results in the holographic display. Directly above the crevasse was, as Woods suspected, the summer triangle.

-"The Vulture, I mean, Zeus and by extent, Pandora's Box, came from Vega." Eli realized "or any star inside the triangle."

-"Yes, now the question is, it's still there?"

-"There's a planet, Kinnor Minor; a colonization mission is scheduled to get there in the near future."

\- o –

Eli Monygham's field diary

September 25th, 2105

I was right! At least in part, the spectrographic analysis of the urn shown it was carved out of Soapstone, but traces of Enstatite suggested the urn was heated or exploded, just as a chemical warhead! Yet more, Ezra ran a test for provenance and what was the surprise the mineral matched 96% with data from the star Vega.

Alpha Lyrae, or Vega in Lira constellation came from the Arabic " _Al-waki_ " which means Landing, is also represented as a falling vulture " _Vultur cadens_ " and in Sanskrit is called " _Abhijit_ " like the symbol in Bedisa's medallion! This is amazing, all the clues point to Vega.

Vega " _Vultur cadens_ ", along with Altair "The Eagle" and Deneb "The Swan," are an asterism called the Summer Triangle. Those birds represent Zeus in one way or another. The vulture is the bird that devoured Prometheus' liver, The Eagle is the bird who holds Zeus' thunderbolts and the Swan is the form Zeus descended to Earth to seduce Leda. I think the "Engineers" as Shaw called them, came from the stars in the summer triangle, in this case Vega. They are closer than I thought!, is it possible that humanity finds them sooner than I would imagine, I'm worried that they are not as friendly as the Titan Prometheus, and what happens if the settlers come across Pandora's box?

\- o -


	4. Chapter 3: Scorpion Men

**CHAPTER 3: SCORPION MEN**

 **September 25th, 2105. Tomb at Mount Ebrus, Republic of Iranistan.**

Konrad Volkov oversaw the rest of the taskforce working inside the tomb. They had recovered the frozen corpse of the giant humanoid and now it was lying on a stainless steel table inside the mobile lab. He saw the team's chief scientist approaching through the hallway.

-"Dr. Volkov, I've finished the analysis on the corpse. Interesting indeed, it wasn't what we expected to find but not completely waste of money and time." The man said.

-"I want the short story, Doctor. Let the scientific jargon for the official report." Volkov's tone was serious.

-"Ok, the humanoid have 8 feet tall, completely hairless and has white color skin, his eyes were black with dark blue sclera, short, Grecian type nose which joints with prominent supraciliary arch and forehead. Blood is blue in color due to being based on copper, used Hemocyanin instead of Hemoglobin. This is accepted by some as the myth of the royalty's blue blood" Dr. Aleksei explained.

-"There's nothing interesting till now. What about its technology? That's the sole objective of this Taskforce doctor, not some _National Geographic_ documental." Volkov scolded him.

Volkov was right, Stargazer was the spiritual successor of OWLF or Other World Life Form taskforce created by the then Institute of Strategic Defense in the former United States, now United Americas. Weyland Corp had not only bought Lockheed-Martin and other industries and government contractors, also had assimilated the ISD after the company had instigated the formation of a capable space force by the Security act of 2101. Thus, Stargazer was now in control of the R&D department of the now merged Weyland-Yutani Corporation.

Stargazer primary objective had been at the moment of its creation, the acquisition of alien technology for reverse engineering, research and development of new weapons and in the given case the aliens were hostile –and there were files which proved that –to have a means of neutralize the menace.

-"I'm sorry Dr. Volkov, but this alien, this Titan as you call it didn't have any advanced technology and there's nothing on the Temple resembling a weapon more sophisticated as a club or sword." The Doctor was trying to appease the growing anger of his boss.

-"Fine, what about the rest of this Tomb? All those inscriptions and markings had to be something."

-"Well, we had literally thrown the experts on those markings out of here, but we may discover something." Aleksei explained. "We need more time here."

-"You better hurry, Doctor." Volkov said, and then turned to his lieutenant "Set the charges, I want this place covered up as soon as possible"

\- o –

After Volkov leave, Dr. Vladislav Aleksei hurried into examine the tomb before they set the charges. It was Volkov's modus operandi to erase all evidence of any illegal operation they have been conducted after extracted anything useful, so no other companies or government take advantage of what was left.

He observed the circular platform where the giant had been chained. A trail of dark blue blood ran from the corpse past the center and into an ice covered crevasse. "Odd" he thought, and remembered the Giant's ribs bent outside "something came out of it?" The crevasse was sealed by ice, it was enough for a man to crawl inside, and it seemed something was at the end. Through the clear ice he saw a blurred white shape. "What's that?"

One of the guards walked out of the hall towards the corridor, he was whistling while his rifle swung under his arm. As he passed a series of inscriptions, the symbols on the wall shone with a pale yellow light. Aleksei noticed and he reached them, out of curiosity. The inscriptions were carved on the stone above a niche, on it, there was a flute. The guard whistled again and the carvings shone a little.

-"They react to sound?" Aleksei thought, and then an idea crossed his mind "or the music?" He took the flute and blew it. The inscriptions turned on like a Christmas tree. At that very moment, motes of blue light lit on the corridor and he exclaimed, surprised, the guard also stopped.

On the platform, he saw ghostly figures formed by the blue motes. "A hologram" he reasoned, the inscriptions on the wall reacted first to the whistle and then to the flute, activating a holographic recording, albeit one of low definition.

The hologram shown what he recognized as the corpse on the morgue, chained to the mountain, two more giants came forth in front of him. They wore robes and metal garments, the tallest a crown made from iron-like metal representing a vulture, and the other wings like those of a swan on his helmet, and a necklace on the shape of a big U or a Lyre, albeit one highly stylized and bulbous.

The one with the U pulled out something from his robe, some kind of urn, and put it in front of the chained giant, and then both giants retired from the platform towards the exit. The upper part of the urn opened and a cloud of tiny motes were expelled; these motes introduced into the giant by his mouth and nose. The giant shuddered and Aleksei saw how he opened his mouth in a silent scream.

The hologram flickered and then resumed its recording. The chained giant shuddered and convulsed, after a brief moment, he started to bleed from nose and mouth. Suddenly, something erupted from the giant's belly, Dr. Aleksei's thoughts were that it resembled a placenta, from it, a creature uncoiled, Elongated head, skeletal, thin body and a long scorpion-like tail, like one of the creatures depicted on the sculpture at the entrance. The tiny creature fled towards the crevasse, leaving the blood trail.

-"What the Hell was that?" the guard returned and interrupted Dr. Aleksei's thoughts

-"A holographic recording system, it seems." Aleksei "responded, activated by your whistling and the flute. Bring me the portable drill; I want to excavate the crevasse"

-"You think that thing is still there?" the Guard asked.

-"Dead and perfectly preserved I hope" Aleksei responded.

\- o –

An hour later, the ice gave way to a small frozen cavern; Dr. Aleksei introduced himself and pointed his flashlight at the far end. A block of clear blue ice shone in the dim light. Inside the ice, a pure white skeletal body was coiled.

-"I'll be damn" he exclaimed "Is still there."

He crawled inside and began to cut the ice with his pickaxe. The creature inside was in fact the same shape as the ones in the sculpture. Eyeless, long headed and clawed monsters. "What the fuck are those?" he thought.

Since he had joined the Stargazer program, Dr. Aleksei was aware there was extraterrestrial life out there, and some of those things were really ugly, but the thing encapsulated in the ice was something out of a nightmare, he could not give it any slightly human feature that made him think it was smart, or that he could communicate with it or even train it like an animal.

-"Need a tissue sample" his pickaxe reached the arm of the creature. Aleksei pulled a syringe and pinched the creature's skin. A pressurized jet of a yellowish liquid sprouted from the puncture, when it touched the ground, hissed and smoke rose where the liquid reacted with the stone.

-"What the hell? Acid?" Aleksei was surprised, so much that he did not see how the creature's arm began to move and the ice around it cracked. A cold, clawed hand gripped Aleksei's arm and he turned, only to see the ice block breaks and the creature inside came back to life, in stasis after thousands of years. He screamed briefly just before a long tail cut his neck in a sweep, the recently revived creature let out a triumphant screech.

\- o -

The guard who had been outside the crevasse heard a blood-chilling cry coming from the cave and called Dr. Aleksei. He obtained another screech as answer. Not knowing what the hell what was happening he raised his rifle towards the opening. A fast white blur came from it and threw him on his back, the creature was over him and he couldn't move. He managed to fire the rifle without hitting it and the last thing he saw were the pink, teeth-filled gums of the creature extending out of its mouth into his face.

-"Those were shots" Gunther, the man setting the charges said, after hearing fire arms noise coming from inside the tomb. He was holding the detonator and the charges were set, he ordered the other two to investigate.

The two disappeared in the corridor's darkness and after a few seconds, screams and gunfire filled the Atrium, followed by inhuman screeches and shrieks. Gunther had a vague idea what Stargazer was after; he had heard crazy stories but never believed them. He started to wonder if those were truth, and something was hunting them in the darkness of the Temple.

Holding his 9 mm pistol in one hand and the detonator in the other, he faced the dark opening of the temple. He heard sounds of steps and grunts, something was coming. He aimed the pistol towards the dark. A white figure, pale as a ghost appeared on his field of view, at first appeared humanoid in shape but it was crouching on four, on its mouth, it had the severed arm of one of the guards.

The creature had no eyes but Gunther was sure it was looking directly at him while emitted a series of short snorts. The creature dropped the arm and showed him its pointed fangs. Gunther screamed and then the creature launched itself at the man, biting him on the chest; the dying man screamed and by pure reflex, pressed the detonator. The charges detonated and the tunnels filled with fire, the creature screeched as it was consumed and then the whole Temple collapsed, crushing any remains.

Outside, Dr. Konrad Volkov saw how the explosion generated an avalanche which destroyed the west side of the mountain, and with it, the Temple and construction site.

\- o –

Eli Monygham's field diary

September 26th, 2105

No! I received news of an accident in a construction site in Iranistan, right in the slopes of Mount Ebrus. They said the side of the mountain collapsed and the subsequent avalanche buried the construction site and the camp. Fortunately the main construction team wasn't there, only a small engineer team who suffered few casualties. I suspect this was an intentional demolition by Dr. Volkov and his mercenaries, whatever they were looking for, they didn't want anyone there. But I´ll keep that opinion for myself.

Anyway, we had received DNA testing results; the genetic material taken from the dead Titan was close to that of a human with a few significant differences: First of all, it had a rare mutation which duplicate gene Xq26, causing its gigantism; second, another anomaly is the gene CD117, giving them a deficiency of melanine, this is the possible cause of Albinism, and third: Genetic sequence, no doubt hominid and from the genus Homo, is related to those found in Denisova cave in Siberia, We could not be sure, but they could be a branch of Homo denisovan or another human sub species.

Eli Monygham's field diary

January 26th, 2110

Today, after two years of bloody war and other two years of recovering economy, the first of the third wave Colonization ships parted towards Vega. Torin Prime civil war had stopped human diaspora to the outer rim for nearly five years. All resources, both human and technology had been diverted to liberating one of the inner colonies from J'har rebels, a religious extremist movement aimed to stop the human expansion.

The HMS Argo carried a hundred colonists bound to the recently twin planets of Kinnor Major and Minor, discovered some years before but barely explored. I'm thrilled of what they'll found there. I signed in for the mission but apparently the Institute thought I am more valuable teaching than exploring. I wonder if this has something to do with what happened on Mount Ebrus and the loss of the temple.

After the accident, we get back there but Wey-Yu had the place locked tight. Re-routed the path of the road and labeled the area as a natural sanctuary, forbidding any mining or excavation activity.

\- o –


	5. Chapter 4: Vega

**CHAPTER 4: VEGA**

 **April 26th, 2111. Earth Central Time. Colony ship HMS _Argo_.**

Humans have been spreading along the cosmos since early twenty first century, first Luna, then Mars and the Jovian moons. A second phase colonization came with the development of the FTL drive in 2039, Proxima and Alpha Centaury, Barnard and Luyten stars, Groombridge 34 and others within 16 Light years from Earth were colonized on the first decade of twenty second century.

The planned Third colonization wave focused on those stars ranging 40 Light years from Earth, Vega, Altair, 61 Cygni A, Beta and Gamma Virginis, Epsilon Reticuli and Zeta Reticuli, unfortunately, a Civil war broke out in one of the inner colonies, Torin prime. The bloody campaign lasted for two years in which the colonizing efforts suffered due to the flow of materials necessary for the construction of colony ships stopped and acts of terrorism and piracy in exploration ships and probes.

When the first exploration probe reached Vega, initially thought not having planets, just a debris ring. What was the surprise it actually housed two terrestrial planets inside the habitable zone. More than that, both planets were tidally locked, meaning they not only translate around Alpha Lyrae but they spun around a common center few thousands kilometers away each other.

One of them was slightly larger than Earth, and was named Kinnor Major; the other was approximately the size of Mars and was christened Kinnor Minor. Kinnor Minor, the Hebrew name for "Small Lire" had an atmosphere like that on Earth and Major had none but a strong magnetic field, thus, this planet array increased Kinnor Minor's gravity and made the little planet the best candidate for colonization.

-"Polar orbit stable, Captain Blackburn" the onboard computer of the HMS _Argo_ announced.

-"Yahoo!" Carlisle shouted with emotion. The redhead woman was the ship's captain and was in charge of nearly two hundred first wave colonists. "You heard that? We're finally here after one year!"

-"Easy girl, we have a lot of work to do" Her husband, Charles Blackburn, eased her. Blackburn was the ship's first officer and second in command of the _Argo_. "Drop the survey satellites; we need the network working before the first lander touches down."

-"Right. Mother, drop the satellites" She said.

-"Yes, captain." MUTHUR complied.

As the _Argo_ passed through the planet, a series of soccer balls sized satellites dropped from a ventral hatch, creating a geo-synchronic network which would be useful for comms and GPS navigation.

The holographic table on the bridge flickered and starts to map the terrain. Carlisle and Blackburn observed mountains, plateaus and valleys yet unseen because a thick layer of bluish clouds.

-"Look, there's a river on that valley." Blackburn said to his wife, pointing at the holographic map. They had decided the side of the planet facing out of Kinnor Major would be the best place for the colony, as the gravity field there was almost identical of Earth's.

-"Clouds, liquid water, mountains, this is a good place for the colony." Carlisle added.

More than good, one of the challenges in planet colonization and terraforming was the absence of a breathable atmosphere and liquid water.

The _Argo_ was a newer model of the _Covenant_ -class colonization vessel. As with the _Covenant_ she was designed to remain in orbit while the Landers and cargo lifters brought down personnel, equipment and later, the ship itself; The _Argo_ hauled six main modules: Habitat, Control center, Vehicle bay, water treatment and processing plant, an atmosphere processor plant and a foldable greenhouse dome. These modules were brought planet side by the ship itself.

Here, on Kinnor minor, the atmosphere processor would be used only to scrub the air of pollution and then turned into the main fusion reactor power plant for the colony.

-"There's a clearing on the clouds–" Blackburn stopped midsentence and then, they exclaimed "Oh my God."

-"Amelia, you better take a look at this" Carlisle called Dr. Amelia Hartford, the expedition's biologist and wife of Administrator Alan Hartford.

Behind them, a Matisse of greens covered every inch of the land surface. Tall grass and bushes upholstered the valleys, and a thick, dark and bright green forest covered the mountains' foothills. The existence of extraterrestrial life was known since 2019 when Weyland Corp revived NASA's program JIMO and discovered simple organisms in the ice covered ocean on the Jovian moon Europe, but the finding of complex plant life in another star was a complete surprise.

-"I can't believe it!" Amelia exclaimed, excited. "Look those trees height, it has to be due to the star's blue light."

-"I'll prepare the first lander." Carlisle said.

-"I'm going down with you, Carli –There's no way I'll remain here over a planet full of life." Amelia exclaimed.

\- o –

The lander shake as it entered the atmosphere; there was turbulence above the thick cloud layer but Carli kept the drop ship steady. A few more minutes, the tiny ship passed through and landed on the west bank of a wide river, tall yellow-green grass covered the valley.

-"Ok Who wants to be the first?" Carli asked. "At least, on this planet"

Before any of the other eight passengers could say a word, Amelia exclaimed

-"Are you freaking lost your mind? Of course I want!" and she ran for the airlock.

-"Easy girl, Put your helmet first, I don't care if the air has the right mix of gases; I don't want any of my crew sick from an unknown pathogen. Remember that Ganymede incident?"

-"I know, Mom. Always wear a condom when banging an unknown guy" she said, imitating a teenage girl whose mother tells her about the realities of life. The rest of the expedition laughed.

The Lander's ramp descended and sunk on the sandy soil, she cannot feel the breeze through the suit and helmet but Amelia saw the grass moving. Behind her, Iris, the ship's synthetic commented:

-"This seems a good place for the colony, Mrs. Hartford. Can I commence to collect soil, air and water sample for analysis."

-"Yes, Iris" She agreed, and then passed the Android a bag with plastic sterile containers "Take these, I'll set up the mobile lab over there, under that tree."

The android woman took the equipment and proceeds to fulfill the task. Amelia used a remote control to bring a Mobile Analysis Lab or MAL, deploying it under a wide acacia-like tree.

The biologist introduced the canisters in the mass spectrograph and electronic microscopes and waited for the results. One Hour later, the machine emitted a series of beeps.

-"Soil pH is 5.7, perfect for a variety of crops, the same for the water. Air is free of toxins, just pollen and dust, careful with allergies. Water is free of bacteria and protozoa, just diatoms and green-blue algae." Amelia said, after seeing the results.

-"No fauna?" Iris asked.

-"Now that you mention it, I have not seen a single insect, or bird, anything." Amelia commented it was strange: there were plants similar to those on Earth, at least in appearance, a DNA test would reveal if they were identical.

-"Well, at least we can take these off." Carli said, at the same time she took off her helmet. " _Argo_ , did you receive me?"

-"Go ahead, Lander. We receive you five by five, honey" on radio, Blackburn responded.

-"All clear Cap, the place is perfect. You can bring down our home, we can settle our little house on the prairie now" Carlisle said.

-"Good to hear it" he said "Find us a nice place by the river, Carli"

-"I'm not gonna make a land run for you, Chuck" She responded.

Four hours later, they heard the _Argo_ descent with the first of the modules –the control center –under the belly. It landed at the center of the grass field and deposited the cargo there. It took five more trips to complete the basic layout of the colony.

\- o –

Eli Monygham's field diary

May 7th, 2111

The major discovery since Project JIMO had found simple life in Europe back in 2019, but thawing extraterrestrial worms is nothing compared with the finding of complex plant life in a planet 26 light years away! Evolutionary biologists and the scientific community are getting nuts by this. Institutions and companies are requesting rights for exploration in the system, but the Extrasolar Colonial Administration decided the wildcatters had priority, unless they find something really interesting, all rights are theirs.

\- o –

 **June 25th, 2111. Earth Central Time. Kinnor Minor, Alpha Lyrae (Vega)**

Tree branches crunched as the eight wheeled heavy duty Daihotai tractor made its way through the thick jungle in one of the mid-continent plateaus.

Two months after landing, the colonists had put all their efforts to explore this new untouched paradise, that was the reason the tractor, driven by the wildcatter Trenton brothers and crew, was exploring the thickest part of the jungle.

-"If it wasn't for the blue star above us, I will say we're back in the jungles of Earth, Amazon or maybe India." Jonas Trenton said to his brother, James.

-"How's possible there's Earth vegetation here? On an alien planet" James disagreed.

-"How'd you know Earth isn't the one filled with alien vegetation? Listen, James, as far as we know the universe is huge and we have only explored the tip of the turd." Jonas said.

-"Yeah, Well if these trees are like those from Earth, we could find something valuable here." James responded.

Jonas wasn't far from the truth. A new age of exploration had started and new discoveries were around the corner: oil, gas, rare earth minerals, Uranium and Helium-3 were profitable resources, but plant life also meant biofuels, fibers, medicines and of course, recreational drugs.

-"That's the attitude, bro. Let's find some new meds and drugs. Hey, you two, how're you doing back there?" Jonas asked his two associated, a Latino man named Alan Gonsalves and an Italian woman named Brenda Casella.

-"I told you, Brenda. This jungle freaks me out; it's not like the jungle of Central America." Gonsalves was arguing with his partner.

-"Can you tell me why, Gonsalves? This jungle is exactly like those on Earth, just trees and vines, except it's not on Earth. There are no wild animals here, not snakes, not jaguars, no spiders. There's nothing dangerous there" she responded.

-"Didn't I tell you anything about my hometown legends?" Gonsalves asked in a dark tone.

-"C'mon, Gonsalves, we're on early-22st century and you still believe on ghost stories and the boogeyman?"

-"This legend isn't about ghosts, or a boogeyman. It happened in 1987..."

-"Man, that's almost a hundred and twenty years ago" Brenda said.

-"In Valverde, where I'm from, then just a small country in Central America, there are stories about a demon who hunt men and makes trophies with them. It's called _El diablo cazador de Hombres_ "

-"A demon? Now I know you lost the rest of your sanity" -Brenda sighted.

-"Back then, a special forces of green berets, disappeared on a mission. Short time later, a team of commandos sent to find them disappeared too. Only two survived: the team leader and a woman" the prospector said. "She told my great grandfather's grandfather that _El diablo cazador de hombres_ killed both units, but this diablo, this demon, was not a supernatural being, but some kind of alien"

-"An alien? That's absurd" Brenda was growing impatient "In all these years in which humanity has colonized the stars we have not encountered any technological species. C'mon Gonsalves, there's no alien life on this jungle"

-"The account says that this alien, this 'hunter', hunts on warm places. And this jungle is hot as shit." The man continued.

-"Ok, that's enough. I don't want to hear more of this nonsense. Hey Jonas, can you believe that bullshit?" Brenda said finally.

-"Jungle mumbo-jumbo, Brenda; I have worked all around the world and every godforsaken village has boogeyman stories to scare children–"

The tractor skidded in a mud puddle and James hold firmly the steering wheel, the vehicle stopped and the man cursed.

-"Damn! We can't go further, not unless we used the Timberjack loader to clear a path. Brenda, Alan; move your asses and prepare the tree cutter."

-"I need to take a leak. Wait for me." Jonas said to his brother.

-"Be careful." James responded, while lowered the aft ramp of the tractor, revealing the green chassis of a Caterpillar P-3000 TimberJack, a mech-like exoskeleton equipped with chainsaws at the end of its arms. These were a line designed exclusively for Sawmills and road construction in woodland areas.

Jonas walked through the gigantic ferns. He could still heard Brenda and Gonsalves arguing, now about androids.

-"Gonsalves, Stop, I had enough with your Diablo story, I don't want to hear you talk nonsense about the synthetics." Brenda tried to be calm, but clearly she wasn't.

-"Told you, those robots were not trustful, the corporation who built them, Cyberdyne, did not follow the three laws" Gonsalves continued.

-"First, synthetics are built by Hyperdine –a W-Y subsidiary –not Cyberdine, jackass. Second, Synths don't like being called robots, but artificial persons, you hear? And third, A-2's are not like those creepy guys made by Seegson, the Working Joes, those plastic bastards really creep me out." Brenda said.

-"Ha! Then you're distrustful of androids too" Gonsalves said in a sarcastic manner.

-"Shut up, we have a job to do. Get your ass on the chopper"

Looking around the thick jungle, Jonas realized if he'd lose orientation will be impossible for the others to locate him, even with those Personnel Data Transmitters, or PDT the colonist must wear all time. The jungle was so thick even infrared will fail to detect a person walking around.

The sound of a saw broke the silence, branches and leaves fell around Jonas and he barely avoided being hit by a falling log. He protested.

-"Hey, Gonsalves; be careful with that thing, you almost killed me!"

-"Sorry" Alan cried over the noise, strapped to the Timber jack's cabin.

-"Clear that way." Jonas pointed to the other side of the Tractor.

Alan maneuvered the Timber jack and start cutting a mat of vines. Suddenly the chainsaw hit a rock.

-"Damn!" Jonas exclaimed as pieces of the chain flew everywhere. "Alan, watch out!"

Jonas crouched in time and after the fragment rain stopped, he got up and saw the rock his partner had hit. At first sight it was a piece of Andesite, black mottled with red iron oxide, barely rectangular block. Jonas wondered if they were at the edge of an ancient Andesite flow. Usually, volcanic activity was a sign of possible ore deposit. He wasn't a geologist but he knew some minerals.

-"I'll be damned" exclaimed.

-"What? Did you found gold or something?" James asked.

-"I think we're settled for life, Bro." Jonas responded, and then cleared the bush for the others to see what he has found. James stood there speechless.

The rock didn't contain any gold. Instead, it was carved with a great number of inscriptions in an unknown language, or at least unknown to them. To Jonas it seemed like those in the temples of India where he had worked back on Earth, at the other side of the Stele, humanoid figurines were sculpted. Even more, through the branches, he saw more of the stone blocks forming a wall.

\- o –


	6. Chapter 5: Expedition

**CHAPTER 5: EXPEDITION**

 **July 5th, 2111. Earth Central Time. Wellington Institute's administrative building.**

Eli hurried into the building; she almost tripped at the entrance. She asked the guard for the meeting and the old man pointed to an elevator.

-"Wait!" She shouted. A tall, lanky man was inside. He stopped the door from closing. "Oh, thanks. Third floor please"

-"Urgent meeting?" the man said "I was called too. I don't know why. Gilbert Kane" the man extended his hand.

-"Dr. Elisabeth Monygham, Astro-archaeology department"

-"Nice to meet you, Dr. Monygham" the man said. Eli noticed the seriousness and beady eyes of the man.

-"And what is your thing?" she asked.

-"Engineering and grade B pilot; I studied medicine at Bryce-Watkins Medical school, before I was forced to study engineering due to some… problems" he paused and then added "with certain medications"

Two years after enrolling in Bryce-Watkins Medical School, civil war at the inner colony of Torin Prime started and due to his military instruction on Gunning Foss Military School, Gilbert Kane was recruited in a hospital ship –the UKMS _Outreach_ –in orbit around the planet attending injured marines. The constant stress and lack of sleep led him to medicate himself with morphine and other drugs. It was not unusual for other doctors to do it, but Kane was not careful and almost died of embolism product of an overdose, sending him into a comma for 107 days. After that he was discharged and expelled from school.

The elevator's door opened and they headed for the office. There, there was a man who greeted them.

-"Please, come in." the man said "Dr. Monygham, Mr. Kane, please sit down."

-"What happen, Mr. McKingsley?" Eli asked.

Brian McKingsley typed a few commands on his computer and a holographic screen appeared. It shown schematics from a _Covenant_ -class colonial vessel, debris filled star system and images from a jungle planet.

-"As you know, the colonization of Vega system revealed that the twin planet Kinnor minor has complex plant life comparable to that of Earth. But two days ago, we received a transmission from the planet where they reported that a group of prospectors had found ancient ruins..." McKingsley explained.

-"Ruins? Actual alien ruins?" Eli interrupted, intrigued.

-"Yes, they had found an abandoned city, with an unknown language –at least to me –but I'm sure one you're familiarized with, because you and Dr. Rashid had worked with Andrew Woods studying it" McKingsley continued "It is a pity that the Professor is no longer among us, it would have been of great help, and for that reason, the head of this expedition falls over you, Eli."

-"Expedition?"

-"The Wellington Institute was commissioned by the Colonial Administration and the Sir Peter Weyland Memorial Library for the study of those ruins, and we entrusted you that endeavor. Of course, Mr. Kane here will act as your co-supervisor and will be in charge of all the administrative issues."

Kane said nothing, just nodded.

-"Good, the expedition will depart in one month aboard the HMS _Zahi Hawass_ , the Institute's exploration ship. I suggest start gathering your team and equipment from now."

Brian McKingley dismissed them, and the pair left the office. Eli headed back to the Archaeo-astronomy department with the intention of selecting the team. Nirajit Rashid of course will be her first choice.

\- o -

Eli Monygham's field diary

July 5th, 2111

I knew it! The Wellington Institute received a transmission from Kinnor Minor. A wildcatter team found some kind of ruins! The Wellington Institute was the institution charged with exploring and reporting the findings to the Sir. Peter Weyland Memorial Library, and I was chosen to lead the expedition, unfortunately they assigned me a co-supervisor. I had met him on the elevator, he was a former Bryce-Watkins medicine school student expelled for substance abuse, and had recently graduated from Wellington in Masters of Engineering. Great! A yonkie engineer; the Institute had commissioned one ship –the HMS _Zahi Hawass_ –a _Prometheus_ -class exploration ship, refitted for the task. We'll be boarding it on August 3th, almost a month from now. I had a lot of work to do.

\- o –

 **October 26th, 2112. Earth Central Time. H.M.S. _Zahi Hawass_ , in route to Kinnor Minor.**

The dark corridors of Her Majesty Starship _Zahi Hawass_ came to life as the ship approached the Vega star system. The Zahi Hawass, commissioned by the Institute specially for the new discoveries at Kinnor Minor, was a repurposed _Prometheus_ -class space exploration vehicle named after a famous Egyptologist back in early 20th Century. It was equipped with two analysis labs, two all-terrain cargo vehicles and archaeology tools ready for excavation and restoration of ancient ruins and sites, all proved back on Earth and Vallis Marineris at Mars.

H.M.S. _ZAHI HAWASS_ REG: WIT2110 _PROMETHEUS_ -CLASS STARSHIP.

CREW: JONES, RONALD. CAPTAIN

KANE, GILBERT W., PILOT/CO-SUPERVISOR

TURNER, ELLIS. COMMS OFFICER

PEREIRA, ANTONIO. NAVIGATOR

FLORENCE MODEL 3B, MEDICAL OFFICER

OWNER: WELLINGTON INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY

CONTRACTOR: EXTRASOLAR COLONIAL ADMINISTRATION.

BOUND: ALPHA LYRAE (VEGA), COLONY WORLD OF KINNOR MINOR (LB-328)

PASSENGERS: DR. ELISABETH MONYGHAM, ASTRO-ARCHAEOLOGIST/SUPERVISOR

DR. NIRAJIT RASHID, ASSISTANT ARCHAEOLOGIST

EZRA MODEL 1A, GEOLOGIST AND MINERALOGIST

EQUIPMENT: 2 RT SERIES PERSONNEL TRANSPORT

4 NR7 ALL TERRAIN VEHICLES

1 CAT P-3000 POWERLOADER EXOESKELETON

1 DRILLING EQUIPMENT

THE LUXURY ESCAPE POD FROM THE PROMETHEUS-CLASS SHIP HAVE BEEN REMOVED AND REPLACED BY A MOBILE LABORATORY, EQUIPED WITH LAST GENERATION ANALYSIS AND DETECTION GEAR.

Lights turned on inside the hyper-sleep chamber and after that, the computer proceeded to the task of waking up the crew.

-"Easy Dr. Monygham, Dr. Rashid. Don't get up so fast or you'll feel nauseous, take your time." Florence said the pair. "You're not used to space travel."

-"I'm feel like I'm been sleeping for decades" Eli commented.

-"Actually was one year, three months and two days you've been on hypersleep." Ezra responded.

-"Yeah, whatever" Eli said waving her hand. Then she asked her colleague "How're you Rashid?"

-"I'm fine, you know my faith forbids me from drinking alcohol but, is this how you're supposed to feel in a hangover?" Dr. Rashid opined.

-"Worst" Eli ran for the bathroom, covering her mouth.

-"Doctors, after you get dressed, join the rest of the crew in the galley, please. We have not arrived yet due to the amount of debris in the system." Ezra explained.

Elisabeth envied Ezra because he looked so fresh after waking up, he didn't have any dizziness or nausea from hyper-sleep, but Eli had to remind herself Ezra wasn't even a man. Ezra, much like Florence, was an Android, a cybernetic organism designed by the Institute based on released versions of previous Weyland series.

Professor Andrew Woods was surprised when he realized this; He had never seen an android with African-descendant features. As they were designed as assistants and servants, and thus far they weren't recognized as second class citizens, Androids were given white skin and hair ranging from blonde to black, but most of the designers thought black skin will remind people of segregation and intolerance. That wasn't the case for Eli, Rashid or the rest of the Institute staff as they had asked for Androids with a variety of features, both male and female. At the institute, synthetics were treated as personnel and not as equipment.

\- o -

After a while, Dr. Monygham and Rashid came inside the mess hall. On the table, pilot and Eli's co-supervisor Kane was happily eating his breakfast.

-"Good morning, sunshine" Kane said; he took a spoon full of a not so good looking cereal.

-"You woke up early" That wasn't a question.

-"It's a bad habit that I have" he responded. "I don't need as much as rest as you"

-"Are you an android Mr. Kane?" Eli asked. Since she had seen him on the elevator, it seemed to Eli that Kane was too serious and mechanical to be human; he indeed looked like the newest A2 series executive androids.

-"Oh no, I'm totally human… I can prove to you" Kane objected "Since I was in the medicine school. You already know of –" he paused, the rest of the crew entered the mess hall "my thing with certain substances. You know, the best way to get rid of an addiction is to change it for another"

-"You still take drugs?" Eli asked

-"The most legal of all, caffeine, the best coffee is the first to leave the kettle"

-"I guess so" She always drank her coffee mid-morning.

\- o –

 **A/N: Chapter under revision.**


	7. Chapter 6: Ruins

**CHAPTER 6: RUINS**

 **October 27th, 2112. H.M.S. _Zahi Hawas_ , descending towards Kinnor Minor.**

The _Zahi Hawass_ bumped as it touched the upper atmosphere of Kinnor Minor; Gilbert Kane tightened his grip over the controls. Captain Jones didn't bother looking at him; he simply continued staring at the large duro-plastic front panels. Soon the ship entered the blue-gray clouds and condensation filled the windows.

-"You can undo your seat belts, ladies and gentlemen" Kane exclaimed, the ship shuddering ceased.

-"Oh, _Alhamdolilah_ " Nirajit exclaimed "I think I'm going to puke all over the cabin"

-"Hey, I'm not that bad," Kane protested "the descending was pretty nice thanks to my piloting skills"

-"That doesn't have any merit Mr. Kane, the navigation system of a _Prometheus_ -class ship do all the work" Eli intervened "I want to see you trying to pilot an _M_ -Class cargo hauler in a large terrestrial planet."

\- " _The lady doth protest too much, methinks_ " Kane quoted "You're missing the view" he pointed out, where the green covered mountains filled the view.

Humans were surprised there were planets so similar to Earth, not only in size, gravity and water content, but in vegetation. The first colonists expected to find animals, but there were none, it was a mystery.

The jungle on Kinnor was deprived of flowers, plant life limited itself to ferns, cycads, pines and mosses; species which didn't required pollinizers for reproduction and survived the disappearance of animals there. Kinnor twin planetary system was designated LB-328, the LB meaning Life Bearer, unlike LV, Life Viable designation.

The ship glided over a wide river valley, Eli saw the colony constructed in one of the river banks. The settlement consisted of the administrative building, the housing unit, a clinic and a garage for exploration vehicles. Because the planet was habitable from the beginning, it wasn't necessary to install an atmospheric processor.

The _Zahi Hawas_ turned its thrusters in a vertical position and settled on the colony's landing pad. By the time the hangar's ramp descended, the Colony Administrator Alan Hartford was standing there. The crew disembarked and the administration staff gave them a quick tour.

-"Welcome to Kinnor colony, I'm administrator Alan Hartford" He greeted them.

-"I'm Dr. Eli Monygham, and this is Dr. Nirajit Rashid." Eli made the introductions "He is Ezra, Captain Jones and that man is pilot and the expedition co-supervisor Gilbert Kane."

-"I assume you're eager to see the site. It's about five hours travel time" Hartford explained "When the Trenton's found it, they were almost two days out, but in the month you spent traveling here, we have constructed a road."

-"I was hoping for a cleared pad in the zone" Jones intervened "Land the Zahi Hawass right at the site."

-"We don't want to risk at destroying the ruins, Captain." Eli said "The colonists use explosives into clearing areas of trees and rock."

-"Anyway, maybe you can make yourself comfortable at the colony" Hartford said "I'll show you the maps and tomorrow we took you to the site."

The administrator guided them to the main operations center, there inside the surveyor's office, a large screen table showed a satellite map of Sector 5, the place where the ruins were located. The complex discovered by Jonas and James Trenton had the size of a small city, the brothers and their team had cleared only a few acres, but LiDAR mapping from orbit revealed the true extent of the complex.

The ruins were indeed the size of a small city, its disposition, as Eli observed, was in a series of concentric rings, the wall the Trenton's discovered was enclosing the first housing ring. Two more of this rings existed before a central temple complex at the center.

-"Disposition of the city is so similar to Plato's description of Atlantis." Eli commented.

-"What's the purpose of concentric rings?" Dan asked.

-"Maybe it served as a caste system. The lower castes at the exterior ring and the higher castes in the center better protected." Nirajit said, he was guessing, there were so many questions.

-"Have you found any remains? Bodies? Tombs? Anything?" Eli turned towards Hartford.

-"No, there are no traces of the original inhabitants, neither animal on this planet. It's like if it was abandoned" Hartford responded. "But there are paintings and sculptures; they… looked very similar to us."

-"I can't wait until tomorrow. It's gonna be a very long night" Eli said.

\- o -

Ely Monygham's field diary

October 27th, 2112

We have arrived! Better to start my notes now, it's important to document everything as soon as possible. The landing was OK thanks to the piloting skills of Captain Jones and pilot Kane.

Anyway, this planet is a complete mystery, there are jungles like those on Earth, we can prove this by comparing the flora's DNA, but the lack of animal life is what is troubling the exo-biologists. Any planetary engineer knew every habitable ecosystem required a perfectly balanced interaction between animal and plant life, some species die out without any animal symbiotic species, as for example, the Yucca and the moth, bees and butterflies.

\- o -

 **October 28th, 2112. Ancient city ruins, Kinnor Minor.**

Eli adjusted the seatbelt in the passenger bay of one of our two exploration vehicles, Nirajit sat at her right and the co-supervisor, Kane in front of her. To Eli, the man looked excited.

-"Are you excited, Eli?" He asked.

-"You kidding, Right?" she replied with disdain "The find of the century? I'm like a child in a toy store. I'm surprised you show little emotion Mr. Kane."

-"I'm thinking in all the paper work I have to do."

Kane was right, he wasn't to be at the site, his job will be authorize and request supplies and equipment. Eli and Nirajit will do the all the hard work, Eli missed Andrew Woods; he would have been very helpful with the translation of the alien language but had passed away about a year ago. After their discovery at Mount Ebrus, Eli and Nirajit took a diplomat course in linguistics at Harvard with him and Eli was confident it was enough for decipher the language in the ruins, in case it was the same as the tomb on Earth.

-"The jungle is so dense. Not surprise the complex wasn´t detected from the orbit before." Eli said, breaking the ice.

-"We took samples from the trees. The oldest trees are some thousands years old, but that could be wrong due to the different amount of light and slightly thinner pressure." The colony's exo-biologist, Dr. Amelia Hartford explained.

-"We are planning an additional drill hole at the site" Ezra added "See the rock basement and stratigraphic sequence."

The original wall discovered by James and Jonas appeared ahead, the all-terrain vehicles passed through an arch serving as an entrance for the city, Eli's first impression was it shared the same style as the carvings in mount Ebrus, Proto Indo-European. The Trenton's were there, they supervised the installation of a provisional camp, they hoped it was finished by the time the Archeologists arrived but a storm had delayed their job.

Eli admired the reliefs at the entrance, they were so detailed. No doubt the giant pale humanoids had constructed this place as their images appeared occasionally on the motifs.

-"We're right, Rashid." She exclaimed "The Systems –or at least one –in the summer triangle represents Zeus, or his race." Eli wrote again on her Notepad.

-"If this planet truly represents _Vultur Cadens_ , I'm wondering what the other systems have" Rashid responded.

-"I want to see the central temple. If there's something interesting here, it must be there." Eli said, and they walked towards the transport.

They crossed the city's first ring, and then they left the transport and continued on foot. Ezra and one of the colony security guards accompanied them. Eli saw this unnecessary as no animals existed on the planet. It was weird to stay on a place with no background sound, no birds calling, no flies buzzing, nothing.

-"How much is left to get there?" Eli asked.

-"We're almost there" Nirajit Rashid consulted his GPS device, the same he used back at Mount Ebrus, now set to use it on Kinnor Minor.

Suddenly the lower and dense jungle foliage ceased and they came out on a clearing covered by tall trees, in the middle of the clearing, an elliptic door marked the entrance to the central temple, still covered by the jungle.

-"Let's get inside, just a quick view before we have to get back" Eli couldn't hide her excitement.

-"Dr. Monygham, I'm receiving the results from a test by Dr. Hartford, the exo-biologist." Ezra informed.

-"And what they said?"

-"Carbon dating, along with the amount of UV radiation, gravity and atmospheric pressure gives the trees an age of… Wait, approximately two thousand years."

Shortly after their arrival, the exo-biologist Amelia Hartford had sampled the rings of at least twenty trees growing out of the ruins, assuming the trees grown after the city was abandoned as the inhabitants surely did regular maintenance to the buildings, so any tree destroying the ruins will show the time elapsed since the city abandonment.

-"Then the city was abandoned about two thousand years ago?" Eli asked.

-"Until we solve this. Yes." Ezra concluded.

\- o –

Eli Monygham's field diary

October 28th, 2112

The first day was so exciting! So many things to think about, but I have to order my ideas now. The first thing we can assert is the alien language here is indeed the Proto Indo-European found in the temple of Mount Ebrus. Symbols are practically equal to that of the tomb and the star map. I drew some of them in my notebook, I know there are drones and those PUPs Dr. Woods hated some much, but drawing make me feel things more personal, more connected.

\- o –


	8. Chapter 7: Lost

**CHAPTER 7: LOST**

 **November 1st, 2112. Main temple at the Ancient city ruins, Kinnor Minor.**

Two days later, Eli was exploring the halls of the Temple, with a whole city to catalog; she reasoned the main temple or one of the inner circle building would have a map or library, which would narrow their search. There was no point in wasting time with the housing units while ignoring the most important buildings.

-"I wonder the customs and habits of this civilization, what do they eat? What do they believed? Did they have a sense of fashion? Did they wage war? I wonder if they destroyed themselves with their weapons of mass destruction or emigrated somewhere else" Eli talked to herself, absorbed in the inscriptions on the wall.

She was in a great circular hall, aligned with the curved walls, there were four giant head statues, and their features matched those of the humanoid giant found on Earth.

-"Who would they be?" Eli continued, looking the stone faces and their solemn appearance.

She remembered one of her first classes at the Wellington Institute, archaeology 101.

* * *

Eli hurried into the auditorium, it was his first day of comparative archeology class and he was late. "Excuse me, excuse me," he said, and sat down in one of the empty chairs in the front. The Professor gave her an accusing look and continued:

-"As I was saying, these are _Moai_ " he pointed out the stone statues of Easter Island "they were carved as a protection for their villages, much like the _Hermai_ , Simplistic heads and torsos of the Greek divinities used as protection." The image on the screen changed to a marble pillar with a human head and genitals carved on it.

-"Romans eventually adopted the symbol as _Atlantes_ , descendants from the titan Atlas, brother of Prometheus. Meanwhile the _Moai_ disappeared in favor to the cult of the Bird man and the god _MakeMake_ , the creator of humanity" the professor finished.

* * *

-"Are these guys protectors? What are they guarding? _MakeMake_ attracted birds to the island for nesting, and his associated god _Haua_ was the "Chief of Eggs–".

-"Elisabeth, are you there?" Ezra's voice crackled on radio, interrupting her thoughts.

-"Yes, Ezra. What happen?" Eli asked back.

-"Dr. Rashid found an inscription which repeats constantly, he suggests the equivalent word in Sanskrit is ' _Loka_ '" Ezra explained.

-"Send me an image of the symbol, please" Eli ordered, a few seconds later, the symbol appeared in Eli's notepad.

 **लोक**

Eli studied the symbol and looked again, comparing it with those of the wall. She didn't take long to find it. Eli consulted her notepad and found the meaning. According to Sanskrit _Loka_ means Place or World, but could also mean Planet.

-"Rashid, search any associated symbol" Eli talked through radio "that must be this planet's name."

-"Ok, Dr. Monygham" Rashid responded.

Eli was excited, they were near to discover the name of the place, and if she could relate it to any name on mythology, she will be able to track Pandora's box's whereabouts, before any human colony find it and unleash it inadvertently.

With space colonization there were new discoveries, some of them beneficial: new alloys, medicines, construction materials, more efficient fuel sources, but also potentially dangerous, Terraforming of the moon Ganymede thawed the ice shelf and new microbes which initially were harmful infected the colonists. A hundred of them died before a cure was found. Eli knew if some colonists stumbled upon an ancient weapon depot could result in the destruction of an entire planet and potentially thousands of lives would be lost. Maybe she was exaggerating, after all it was just a myth, but evidence strongly suggested that thing existed.

A clicking sound attracted her attention.

-"Who is there?" She asked, knowing she was alone. She heard the sound again; it was like a cricket chirping or a crab clicking its pincers. The sound came from the far end of the hall, she saw nothing.

A few pebbles fell to the ground, the noise echoed all across the hall. Eli approached, trying to discover what was causing the noise. She saw the air ripple above.

-"Odd, it's warm here but not much to cause a haze" she said "Unless there's some kind of exhaust." She approached more.

Eli didn't notice that the floor slabs cracked, and seconds later one of them broke under the weight of the archaeologist. She only had time to scream before falling through the hole at his feet.

-"Aaaaahhhggg" Eli screamed, apparently she was rolling down on some kind of sewer.

She hit her head and lost consciousness. When she'd wake up, almost an hour passed. It was dark, and the hole from she had fell was blocked.

-"Damn, I'm trapped." She cursed. "Hello? I fell on a tunnel, can anyone hear me? Rashid? Ezra?" She called through radio, but received only static.

Air was rancid, stagnant after centuries. "No, not centuries" she corrected "Two thousand years if data is correct"

-"I need to get out of here" She tried to get up but her ankle was hurt, the effort hurt her even more. The rest of her team would be looking for her by now. All she had to do is wait the rescue. But Eli was a restless person and decided that maybe he could take the opportunity to explore the tunnel as much as possible.

-"God, my ankle hurts. I can barely move, but I had to make inventory."

Eli checked her backpack and made an inventory of its contents, she didn't know how much time she'll be down there and she had to ration food and water.

-"Flashlight with battery for eight hours, Six Chemical lights, each last for twelve hours, a 2L water bottle, four energy bars, 1500 Kcal each, thermal blanket Survival kit standard for colony surveyors, very useful. P.D.T., wasted." She recited while assessing the contents of her backpack.

The radio crackled with static. Surely someone was trying to communicate with her, but the thick volcanic rock blocked the signal. Eli just hoped they knew her last position and start looking there. If they saw the collapse, they would assume that she would be below.

But hours passed and there was not a single noise coming from above, and the tunnel was getting cold. She unpacked the thermal blanket and activated one of the chemical lights. Under the phosphorescent green light, Eli noticed roots growing out the tunnel's walls.

-"How deep am I?" she wondered. "Where's this tunnel going?"

These questions lingered on Eli's mind, but as much as she desired to explore, survival manual's first rule was " _stay where you are until rescue, unless there's danger around_ "

"Damn, what if it takes several days to rescue me?" She thought, and then she felt a soft, almost imperceptible air current. "Wind? There must be an opening at the far end."

If there was an opening, it was far, as Eli couldn't see any light. But the walls had an organic look, just as the corridor at the temple in Mount Ebrus, and if the style was similar, that corridor was long, ending on a wide hall, maybe on the exterior.

She was hungry; Eli consulted her watch and saw it was late. The sun had set by now and that would be dark outside. She took a bar and ate it; then, she rolled herself up in the blanket and fell asleep.

 _Beep, beep. Beep_. The sound of the watch woke her up. She had set the alarm to warn her when the sun was up. This planet had nearly the same day duration as Earth. " _Geez, I'm hungry_ " Eli thought, " _but I had only three bars left, and don't know how much time I'll be here._ "

She was right; with no comms she didn't know if there was an operation rescue on course and if she will going to need more time, so rationing must be essential. Eli realized that in order to forget about her hunger, she'll need to occupy her mind.

-"Maybe a little exploration on the surroundings" she said. Her ankle didn't hurt too much after a night of rest, but she had to immobilize it.

Eli checked the backpack and had an idea. She used the camera's support beam as a rod and the Velcro strips on the zippers to make an improvised splint. After that, she quenched thirst by drinking a bottle of water, not fearing dehydration because all over the tunnel, water dripped constantly.

-"One last thing, In case they found this place" Eli piled some rocks on the floor forming an arrow, near the chemical light. If the rescue team found it, they'll know what direction she went.

\- o –

Limping along the tunnel, Eli discovered that the walls had engravings and some small niches. She closed in to examine one of the later.

-"A flute? Inside here?" Eli wondered, seeing the long, holed tube resembling the musical instrument. She read the symbols on the niche's walls, they appeared to be cuneiform, and not the stylized PIE language she had seen before.

After an hour or two, she distinguished a pale light coming from ahead, and the sound of water falling. The noise was a small waterfall coming from a sinkhole, but that was not the thing which amazed Eli.

The cavern on front of her had ancient structures not like those on the jungle above, but a complete different style, almost Egyptian of Aztec. Above, Eli saw the blue sun's light filtered through the vines covering the doline.

-"Maybe I can get out from there if I can climb." She said.

Something caught Eli's attention below; one of the structures was black, with motes of red, just as oxide covered iron. It was in fact an iron pillar, and she had seen one of those before, or so she thought.

Eli climbed down through the slope, reaching the bottom of the cavern. The iron pillar stood slightly bent before her, a series of inscriptions in proto-European furrowed its surface. Now, Eli could remember where he had seen something similar.

It was in one of the seminars by Dr. Elizabeth Shaw she had studied, it was about the relics left behind by what she called "Engineers". Shaw had mentioned the Iron Pillar of Delhi as one of them.

Eli read the inscription on the pillar, it barely translated as: "the remnant of the great glowing heat of a burned-out fire in a once great forest, the [it cannot be read] has quit this [planet]? And had gone to the other world, moving in from [Tripura]?

-"What the heck is Tripura? Glowing heat? What the hell happened here?" There were so many questions for Eli.

Examining the base of the pillar, Eli removed some of the sand, and her fingers touched something solid. She dug, and what was the surprise she unearthed a vessel carved out of stone, a steatite jar just identical to the one in Sukhumi, broken and littered with Enstatite crystals.

-"My god, Pandora's box was used here too" She exclaimed "The great fire which consumed a forest and drove out who ever lived here."

Eli heard the same strange clicking as before she fell to the cave, this time coming from one of the ruins entrances.

-"Who is there? I'm lost, can you help me?" Eli called, then she felt kind of stupid, the planet lacked any signs of animal life, not to say indigenous population… so far.

The noise came from a rectangular doorway partially buried in sand, Eli decided to investigate. Besides, the cavern was illuminated and she could spare one more of the four glow sticks she had left. She bent the plastic tube and soon as the tube glowed with its characteristic green, she entered the collapsed building.

\- o –

 **November 2nd, 2112. Ancient city ruins, Kinnor Minor.**

-"Rashid, search any associated symbol" Ezra heard Eli's voice talking through radio "that must be this planet's name."

-"Ok, Dr. Monygham" Rashid responded.

That was a day ago, Dr. Monygham disappeared after that, and Ezra couldn't find the signal from her PDT, so he went to the main temple, Eli's last known location, but as he wasn't been there before, he failed to recognize the rubble from the collapse as recent.

At nightfall he had alerted the others and Carlisle Blackburn piloted the colony's aircraft, a twin engine VTOL vehicle above the jungle in the hopes of locating Dr. Monygham. By the next day, Gilbert Kane had joined the search.

-"I'll give one more pass, but it's impossible to see through the jungle" Carlisle informed, and the tiny aircraft traced a wide circle over the trees.

-"If Dr. Monygham heard us, she can use the survival kit's flares." Ezra told her.

-"That's why no one must wander alone" Kane intervened "I told her, but she's stubborn."

-"At least you could be sure she hadn't run into a wild animal." Carli told them. "There's no animal life on Kinnor Minor"

-"But we don't know what other surprises await us there" Ezra replied.

\- o –

Ely Monygham's field diary

November 2nd, 2112

Damn! I'm lost. I heard some strange noise up there in the temple and fell on a crevasse. At first I thought it was some kind of sewer or storm drain but after investigating some niches, I found a flute left by the Titans and some cuneiform inscriptions; Professor Woods said once the cuneiform could be translated into music, symbols corresponding with musical notes had been found in an archaeological dig in Ugarit. If only I can play the flute. Well, when I'll get out of here, there may be a settler who knows how to play the flute or some instrument.

\- o –


	9. Chapter 8: Rescue

**CHAPTER 8: RESCUE**

 **November 2nd, 2112. Buried unknown ruins on Kinnor Minor**

The air was cold and humid inside the ruins, Eli shivered. The place was pitch black but the glow stick was enough to see where she was walking.

-"It's absolutely amazing. The architecture style and designs are totally different than those on the surface." Eli was recorded everything she saw in her device.

As she moved through the half collapsed gallery, she discovered more and more fragments of steatite urns. Now Eli had no doubt that someone had used Pandora's Box to destroy a city and then built another over its ruins.

-"Another faction maybe? Or could be a totally different species?" Eli wondered "Until we decipher the language or find some depiction of the inhabitants we will not know."

She decided to get back to the clearing and try to climb over the cenote. Once she had been rescued, she and her team could come back later, and decipher the strange hieroglyphic language. She walked towards the exit, but at some point she heard a voice which oddly sounded like hers

-" _Inside here_ " the voice whispered.

-"What the –?" She exclaimed. Eli didn't believe in ghosts, but the voice wasn't a product of her imagination. She dropped a chem light and drawn an arrow to point the way out, then turned in the passage which ended in a wide hall.

-"All be damn" Eli exclaimed.

Her feet stepped on a fragile object, which broke under his weight. she bent down to see what it was and let out a muted cry as she recognize the black holes of the eye sockets and the concave dome of a skull, a human skull.

-"What the Hell?" Eli grabbed the skull "What in the name of Prometheus is a human skull doing here?

As far as she know, the race who had built the place were giants, Elizabeth Shaw had named them "Engineers" but Eli called them "Titans", the skull on her hands wasn't that of a giant, more than that, it was well preserved after all that centuries. If the skull was inside the ancient city then it would pre-dated the Titan's ruins above.

Eli checked on her backpack and grabbed one of the flares used for signaling from the survival kit. The flare certainly will light the cavernous space more than the flashlight and the chemical lights. She tore of the flare's cap and the room was bathed in reddish light, Eli dropped her jaw in awe.

On the wall, there were hundreds of niches from floor to ceiling, each one with a skull on it, most of them were human but there were others from animals and unidentified species. The display reminded Eli of the _Huey Tzompantli_ discovered in the ruins of Templo Mayor on Mexico City.

The Aztecs, Mayans and almost all Mesoamerican cultures displayed rows of human skulls taken from sacrifices or war captives in a _tzompantli_ , which means literally "Wall of skulls". Eli stepped back to get a better view of the altar, until she bumped on something on the opposite wall, she turned around and let out a cry of surprise.

There was a statue, but it wasn't that of a human, not even one of the Titans depicted on the ruins above. The sculpture's body was humanoid, but stood over seven feet. The body was muscular and was clad in what it seemed a net and a loincloth over its waist. Covering the chest and shoulders it had some kind of light armor made with metal scales. Its hands had five fingers each, but they ended on claws, one was holding a spear or staff and the other a skull, attached to its respective spine.

But the most terrifying feature was its head. The humanoid hair was fashioned in some sort of dreadlocks, adorned with metal rings, it had no nose, a pair of human like eyes stared from a swollen eye sockets and the creature's mouth was formed by four mandibles each ending in a sharp fang, they were widely opened in rage.

-"Bloody ugly motherfucker" Eli exclaimed.

Eli's statement wasn't far from the truth. Unlike the human features of the "Titans", this creature was ugly, almost reptilian; if the "engineers" were the gods, then the creature represented there would be some kind of demon, but then she remembered the representations of Aztec gods and their fangs and fiery faces wielding spears and other barbaric weapons, using human bones and skin as clothes.

-"So, you're the bastard who liked human hearts as offerings?" Eli asked the sculpture.

There were so many discoveries in a short time, now she had two different cultures in one site, and if the clues were correct, more artifacts from these civilizations awaited at least in two other systems: Altair and Deneb, of which Deneb would be out of reach, being 1,425 light years away, too far for current human technology.

-"Let's get back to the crevasse. It's getting late Eli, there will be time to investigate later" Eli said to herself loudly. She grabbed the backpack and followed her tracks back outside the ruins.

Eli examined the rock on the sinkhole and studied the best way to climb outside. Even if she did make it, the jungle above was so dense she would need to climb a tree for orientation. The visible sky was changing from blue to reddish and Elizabeth reasoned it would be dark soon.

-"Great, another day inside this bloody cavern" She exclaimed. Suddenly she realized she was very hungry, and that wasn't unusual because I had not eaten more than an energy bar. The emotion of the discovery had distracted her from the most basic needs.

She found a flat rock and gathered some leaves which fell from the trees above and made a cushion over the rock. She would not spend another night on the hard rock, and also, she piled some rotten branches for a bonfire, because she knew it will be cold. After she ate two more bars, she stretched out on the makeshift bed and covered herself with the thermal blanket.

* * *

Ely Monygham field diary

November 2nd, 2112

I still heard those strange clicking noises; they're like crickets chirping or the sound of crab pincers. But I swear I heard my own voice calling me from one of the halls, and following it, I stumbled into a great hall. It's amazing: A new, completely different species whose city was destroyed by a weapon of mass destruction. This civilization was barbaric, the Tzompantli or "Wall of skulls" and the weapons displayed in the hall bear witness to that. Anyway, the sun is setting again and I'll need to rest if I am going to try to climb that wall tomorrow.

* * *

Eli woke up with the sound of static and an echoed voice.

-" _Dr… gham, can you… me?" a male voice crackled on radio "Elisab…, are… u receiving me?_ "

-"I'm here!" Eli shouted, pressing the transmit button. The radio emitted a pitching noise.

-" _…sabeth if you… this… signal" the man repeated. "…Flying around_ "

They were looking for her but still they can't hear her because she was underground. But if she did climb the signal would be clear. Eli grabbed the backpack and checked the wall for protrusions and holes in where to put her hands and feet.

The problem with limestone is the rock was soft, and the water carved it leaving it smooth and with few or no cracks at all. And there were almost twenty meters high. There was no way Eli would climb over there without proper training and safety lines, less a broken ankle.

-"I'll have to throw the flare and hopefully, they'll see the smoke" Eli reassured.

She threw the flare as a manner of test, the flare only reached half the distance. She hasn't enough strength to throw it out of the cavern, she had to climb.

At first, it was easy, the rock at the base of the crevasse had cracks and protrusions but a few meters above, the waterfall had smoothen the rock, and Eli couldn't climb any further.

-"This has to be enough" She pulled the flare from the backpack, lit it and threw it.

The flare landed just outside the crevasse releasing a thick orange smoke. "Yes!" Eli exclaimed.

The strange clicking noise was heard once more to her left. Eli turned and saw the air ripple by the heat haze, but oddly, the contour had a humanoid shape. Then he heard his own voice whispering.

-" _absolutely amazing_ " said the strange shape.

Her foot slipped on the wet rock and she fell from about six meters high. She only had time for screaming before landing hard on her back and losing consciousness.

\- o –

The small aircraft turned and prepared to return to the colony. On the passenger seat, Kane was still trying to have radio contact with Dr. Monygham, with no result.

-"Elisabeth, can you hear me?" He called. The radio replied with static.

As soon as the sun rose in the sky, Kane, Carli and Ezra took the colony's survey VTOL plane and flown over the city, by mid-morning, they expanded the search north of the city over the densest part of the jungle.

-"LIDAR shown the area is a limestone plateau, full of sinkholes and crevasses." Ezra said "If Dr. Monygham sell into one, it will be difficult to find her"

-"Let's put aside pessimism, Ezra. We will find her" Kane replied.

-"I'll go one more time, there's a big doline out there, and maybe we can even go down… What the Hell?" Carli exclaimed, as she turned the aircraft, a blue lightning surged from the trees into the sky.

-"What?" the two men asked at once

-"A bright ball came out of those trees" she directed the aircraft there.

-"Look! I see smoke! Orange smoke; it's her!" Ezra exclaimed some kind relieved.

Carlisle Blackburn positioned the VTOL craft over the tree covered cenote, Kane strapped himself in a harness and Ezra checked him. "I'm going down; if she's there I'll bring her up"

-"Careful Mr. Kane, the wind does not make things easier." Carli said.

But the man was already descending through the cable using a winch. He passed the tree tops and saw the giant opening of the sinkhole below, he continued until he reached the border and the water from the waterfall soaked his clothes.

-"Did you see her?" Ezra asked through radio.

-"The pit is completely enclosed. And it's full of stone blocks, like ruins or something." Kane responded. "I see her, twenty meters down, she looks unconscious. I'll get her"

\- o -

When Eli woke up, the first thing she saw was a bright white light. She moaned, her head hurts, she just remembered falling.

-"Am I dead?" She wondered, having never believed in an afterlife at all.

-"Easy, Dr. Monygham, you are not completely healed yet" A soft female voice got her back to reality.

-"Florence? Is that you?" She asked.

-"Yes, Dr. Monygham, you're in the Hawass' medical bay. You maybe want to thanks Mr. Kane here, he's the one who pulled out of that cave" Florence explained.

Eli turned right and she saw the weary looking man seated in the couch, he smiled. Of all people on the colony, she never had imagined her co-supervisor, who had never been on the field, was the one who rescued her.

-"Thank you, Mr. Kane" She thanked, and then tried to get up. "I need back to work"

-"Oh, that's a rotund No, Elisabeth" Florence used her name, so she was being serious. "You're not healed yet, I'll get you in observation for two days."

-"Fuck" Eli exclaimed.

-"Don't worry; Dr. Rashid and Ezra will take care of the expedition until you recover" Kane told her.

\- o –

Eli Monygham field diary

November 3rd, 2112

The last week had been overwhelming; my little adventure on the ruins brought so many discoveries in a short time. The find of not only one, but two different cultures will revolutionize what we know about the origins of human civilization. These findings would have made Dr. Shaw's theories insignificant. I can't wait to get out of the clinic.

\- o -


	10. Chapter 9: The Lost cities of Tripura

**November 5th, 2112. Cavern leading to the unknown buried city**

The elevator descended towards the cavern below, where the entrance of the buried city was discovered by Eli. During the last two days in which the doctor was convalescent, the engineers had installed an elevator.

Eli stepped out and passed beside the partially buried iron pillar. Rashid was there waiting for her.

-"Have you deciphered the inscription, Rashid?" Eli asked him.

-"' _the remnant of the great glowing heat of a burned-out fire in a once great forest, the [it cannot be read] has quit this [planet]? And had gone to the other world, moving in from [Tripura]_ '" Rashid read the inscription again. "Apparently it says this forest planet was burned in a fire and the original inhabitants moved to another place."

-"And the name of this planet was _Tripura_ " Eli suggested "That's the word at the end of the inscription. Does make any sense to you?"

-" _Tripura_ was a region of India, back on Earth, in fact, the Iron Pillar of Delhi was from that region, If this is a copy or Earth's is a copy of this, I don't know"

-"We'll find out. Come, let's see the _Tzompantli_ room." Eli invited Dr. Rashid, and they entered the ruins towards the large hallway.

-"Oh, and before you went missing, I deciphered this planet's name. Or at least that of the city" Rashid told her. "The associated symbol was similar to the sanskrit ' _Svarga_ ', and if you read correctly, _Svargaloka_ is the name of the place where Thunder God Indra's palace was located."

-"Indra?" Eli frowned.

"Well, Indra is the Hindi equivalent of Zeus, the God of thunder." Rashid concluded. "It makes sense, both Greek and Hindi myth, as the rest of Middle East and Europe's derived from Proto Indo-European, so they must be different versions of the same story."

They arrived at the hall, now illuminated by potent work lights. Eli and Rashid now could see the true extent of the altar and the sculpture. Rashid analyzed the features of the humanoid depicted there.

-"What do you think, Rashid?" Eli asked.

He couldn't keep his eyes out of the ugly face of the humanoid.

-"A _Rakshasha_ " He said.

-"A what?"

-" _Rakshasa_. From the Sanskrit _Rksas_ which means Beast, some kind of cannibalistic warrior demon. They inhabited forest and hills, killing humans and sometimes devouring them. They appear in the _Ramayana_ and _Mahabharat_ epic. Many heroes had fought them, Rama and Bhim among them" Rashid explained.

-"How are you sure." Eli doubted.

-"Descriptions include fanged faces, they were tall and had clawed hands and feet. They liked to wear human skins and bones." Rashid numbered "Also, they were shape shifters and used something called _Maya_ or magic, they could vanish in the air, but we can't be sure of that seeing the sculpture."

-"Did it say anything about displaying skulls in a wall?" Eli asked, pointing at the niches.

-"No, but it's almost like a trophy room. Like some kind of hunter or warrior."

They turned their attention at the skulls displayed. There were many different shapes, mostly humans, but some of them had thick supracilliary arcs and wide nose pits.

-" _Homo sapiens neanderthalensis_? They hunted Neanderthals? That means this date at least 35,000 years old." Eli exclaimed.

-"Not only them, Look!" Rashid pointed at another skull. One far larger "Titans"

Indeed, the skull on the niche matched the features and size of one of those who Elizabeth Shaw called Engineers, Titans. Eli was dumbstruck, they have found proof not only of one civilization, but two, and both of them had visited Earth on ancient times, at the end of the last Ice age at least. More than that, the two cultures also interacted with each other, possible waged war and the evidence pointed at the Titans destroyed these _Rakshasas_ using their weapons of mass destruction, namely the one Eli called _Pandora's box_.

-"Got it!" Rashid exclaimed suddenly "It makes sense now. _Tripura_!"

-"What is it?"

-" _Tripura_ is the name of a city, or most exactly, three cities in Hindi myth" Rashid told her. "The triple city of the _Asuras_ "

Rashid related then the story about _Tripura_ , the Triple city of the _Asuras_. Long time ago, three powerful demons had made penance to god Brahma the creator. He, pleased, conceded them each one a boon, the three Asuras –some thought to be _Rakshasas_ –asked for immortality but the creator can't grant them that, so they asked for an indestructible fortress, again the creator denied them, but he will built them a city and they can choose the way of its destruction. The three demons asked for three cities made of Iron, Silver and Gold which can only be destroyed when the cities aligned, every thousands of years just for a second by one single arrow fired by Shiva, god of destruction.

Brahma told them that nothing was eternal and the cities were constructed. Many _Asuras_ , _Yakshas_ and _Rakshasas_ lived there for many years and became a powerful empire, so powerful that the _Devas_ , or gods, feared them and they pleaded Shiva to destroy the cities. Shiva destroyed _Tripura_ during the alignment using his weapon, the _Pasupata_.

-"So, you think this buried city is one of them?" Eli asked.

-"Possibly, after the destruction of _Tripura_ , Indra asked the only survivor, an Asuran architect called Mayasura, to build him a city, this city was known as _Amaravanti_ in _Svargaloka_." Rashid concluded. "Mayasura is also the designer of some of the gods' weaponry."

-"Oh my –the myth is real. Or at least some part of it" Eli exclaimed. "Did you think the three cities' ruins are located on each one of the summer triangle systems? Think about it, the cities made of iron, silver and gold, maybe they represent the three birds, the vulture, the swan and the eagle, and here in 'the vulture' we have an Iron pillar…"

-"Maybe, but how did you align the three systems? It's not possible. Not from here, not from Earth." Rashid asked

-"Maybe it's not an alignment _per se_ , maybe it's an event. Astronomically, the only way the summer triangle interacts is during the seventh day of the seventh month" Eli explained "Did you know the story of the _Weaving girl_?"

-"No" Rashid said.

-"Maybe you have heard of it, the _Tanabata_ festival in Japan" Eli continued "The weaving girl, the star Vega, was in love with a shepherd, the star Altair. And their love was forbidden so the girl's mother, the Sky goddess, traced a Silver river between them, the Milky Way. But God took pity of them and every year, during the seventh day of the seventh month, the magpies form a bridge for them to cross and meet for a day. The star Deneb falls just in the middle of the river. That's the moment of the alignment of the three cities."

-"Maybe you're right."

-"But as for the year, the poem dates back 2700 years ago, but we don't know when that exactly happened, and you mentioned a weapon, _Pasupata_ , what is it?"

-" _Pasupata astra_ is the personal weapon of Shiva, the god of destruction in his _Paspati_ form, which means 'Lord of the animals'. We don't know what does exactly, but descriptions say it invokes a large number of demons and a huge spirit which is the weapon's incarnation. It will never be hurled at a lesser enemy or it could destroy the world, as the Weapon kills indiscriminately–" Rashid's words cut midsentence. Eli had her mouth opened by the last words. Both had made the connection but was Eli who pointed first.

-"That sounds exactly like the description of _Pandora's box_ we saw in the temple at Mount Ebrus."

-" _Pasupata_ is the same weapon as _Pandora's box_?" Rashid wondered.

-"Yes, and it was used three times at least, with catastrophic consequences" Eli nodded "If it exist, it will never be found."

-"Dr. Monygham, Dr. Rashid" Ezra voice interrupted them "Get back to the lab, there's something I have to show you."

\- o –

A/N: Welcome back again. Well the story turns out to be kind of mega crossover between Alien, Prometheus, Predator, and also mythology! This chapter had a crazy theory and more. It could be boring as it is mostly exposition but I'm making a point for further action.


	11. Chapter 10: Pasupata Astra

**November 5th, 2112. Analysis laboratory onboard the HMS Zahi Hawass**

They were back at the mobile lab attached to the _Hawass_. The colonists had cleared a small zone inside the city and Captain Carlisle had detached the module there. It was easier to had field results without travelling to the main settlement.

Ezra had run a test on one of the urns found in the buried city and had found something "peculiar"

-"What had you found, Ezra?" Eli asked as they entered the lab.

-"Let me show you, here." Ezra typed on the console and a magnified view of the urn's surface appeared on the holographic screen. "The crystals of this ampule are almost identical to that from Earth. Enstatite due to recrystallization outside the matrix, but here… we have some exotic particles" He typed again and centered the view on tiny black motes.

-"Exotic?" Rashid asked "What do you mean with exotic?"

-"These particle had a clearly artificial composition, some kind of engineered material"

-"Engineered?" now Eli was surprised "Like a chemical compound?"

-"More like nanotech I would say." Ezra concluded.

Eli checked they were alone in the lab. She was convinced Ezra needed to know what they're went into. If those Urns were in fact a weapon of mass destruction, the android would be of great help at decipher it, and contain it.

-"We have reasons to believe these urns contain some kind of weapon of mass destruction, a weapon used to wipe out an entire civilization. We can't risk on reactivate it, so please, do not test it."

-"Whatever it is, is inert now, nonfunctional." Ezra responded. "Maybe we can run a test for the signal which makes it work. Analyze the sequence and see if we can determinate what it does without test it directly."

-"That's a good idea" Eli agreed.

The android ordered MUTHUR to run the test, the screen soon filled with ones and zeroes.

-"This is Amazing!" Eli exclaimed "Even an advanced alien civilization use binary code! But I haven't seen any form of computers or digital data storage. As far as we had seen this Giants were as sophisticated as the Indo valley civilization."

-"Dr. Monygham, if they use nanotech, then they didn't need computers, they can embed anything with nanoparticles and use them as computers."

-"Like use the carvings as a keyboard?" Rashid asked.

-"Could be. MUTHER, analyze the sequence, we want to know what it does." Ezra asked the main computer.

-" _Gladly, Ezra. Analyzing the sequence…_ " MUTHUR responded with her pre-programed voice.

A few minutes later, the main computer announced:

-" _Ezra. The analysis is complete. The signal shows similarities to an evolutionary algorithm, albeit one highly sophisticated._ " MUTHUR announced

-"Evolutionary algorithm?" the android asked.

-"That doesn't sound like a weapon at all" Dr. Rashid commented. "Not at all"

-"Did someone have mentioned an evolutionary algorithm?" Amelia Hartford, the biologist, arrived at that moment "Where?"

-"Dr. Hartford, what are you doing here?" Eli was surprised

-"Sorry, but I heard the notice you found proof of another civilization, humanoid, I wanted to see that life form, I was told it was fairly humanoid but almost reptilian?"

-"Yes but only a sculpture. As far as we know, it could be only a representation of a myth" Eli responded. "I'll send you a copy of my notes."

-"Ok, and what's that?" Amelia had noticed the signal sequence on the screen. "I heard something about an evolutionary algorithm. Maybe I can help you"

-"A binary code, we think this compound is some kind of biomechanical fluid of unknown purpose." Ezra explained. Eli and Rashid hesitated; the less people knew about this the better.

-"Show me" Amelia asked, MUTHER displayed the sequence in binary, a sequence of ones and zeroes, and then changed it to a more readable mathematical algorithm.

-"Mmmm strange, this seems to be aimed only at organisms containing a certain type of mitochondria or mitochondrial DNA, namely animals" Amelia explained, after analyzing part of the sequence "but I don't know why until I'll made a test"

-"No!" Eli exclaimed. Amelia wondered why the archeo astronomer had made such a sudden burst but she explained.

-"We… I have reasons to believe this is an ancient weapon of mass destruction. We came here following clues from a temple on Earth about a weapon capable of killing all life on a planet. Concretely animal life"

-"There's no animal life on this planet" Amelia realized the implications.

-"Listen Amelia, this is important, no one outside of us must know about this, There are people interested for no good reasons, ok?" Eli scolded the biologist.

-"OK, but you had to tell me everything about it" Amelia said.

Eli shared her field notes with Amelia Hartford since the discovery of the temple at Mount Ebrus and how she had made the connection between _Pandora's Box_ and the mythical Deluge and the summer triangle, before telling her the new evidence of _Tripura_ and the _Rakshasa_.

-"So, you think this god, Paspati, was the creator of the weapon and had been used by God to cleanse the Earth in ancient times?" Amelia asked.

-"Yes, _Paspati_ means Lord of Animals" Eli explained "In mythology; the _Astras_ or celestial weapons used the power of the gods they belong. For example, Indra's _Vajra_ was a Thunderbolt, and as you said that thing affects only animals"

-"And what happened to that weapon? Where is it?"

-"The last known record of _Pasupata astra_ was in the poem _Mahabharata_ , the weapon was granted to the hero Arjun after a long penance, but he never used it" Rashid intervened. "Arjun, his brothers and their wife Draupadi died thirty six years after the war after climbing _Svargarohini_ Mountains attempting to reach _Svarga_ or Heaven. Only the oldest brother Yudishtir accompanied by a dog did make it."

-"And where are that mountains?" Amelia asked.

-"Most of the scholars agree _Svargarohini_ are located somewhere in the Himalayas" Rashid said "But I'm not so sure now, if we are talking about an interstellar civilization, could be anywhere. _Svargarohini_ means 'Stairway to Heaven'"

-" _Rohini_ is also one of the lunar mansions in Hindu mythology, and is related to the star Aldebaran, a red giant" Eli told the biologist " _Svargarohini_ could be translated as 'red sky'"

-"So, are you telling me that weapon is most likely to be hidden in the tomb of a deceased hero on a mountain somewhere in the Aldebaran system?" Amelia was intrigued, as a biologist she believed that mythology was just fairy tales.

-"Maybe, pretty much that. And not any mountain, if the measures indicated on the poem are true it must be the tallest mountain in the galaxy" Rashid concluded.

-"Well, that's very nice and I really hope no one find it. But we have here proof of ancient technology and a biology mystery: Why there's no animal life on this planet? And I want answers; let me do a test of that compound, in a controlled environment using fruit flies. Fruit flies are great for studying evolution and we can learn a lot of that" Amelia asked.

-"Doctors, if we are right, the compound is designed to affect only animal life, as synthetics, Florence and I would be the ones qualified to make the experiment, because we cannot be affected by any biological or chemical weapons." Ezra intervened.

-"Well, I admit I'm curious about it too. But at the first sign of trouble, destroy the samples." Eli agreed.

\- o –

The test was ready; Ezra and Florence had placed a sealed container with several fruit flies, some plants and mushrooms inside. That container was inside another sealed part of the laboratory, a little canister containing a tiny amount of the exotic particles rested on a robotic arm controlled by the medical officer, at the test moment, the particles will be vaporized via laser and released inside the container.

-"We're ready, Dr. Hartford" Florence said.

-"Ok, you can proceed. Ezra, be ready with the containment measures." Amelia ordered. She and the others were outside the laboratory, observing through camera feed and other instruments. MUTHUR will analyze data at real time.

Florence maneuvered the canister with the robotic arm and then, a thin red laser vaporized the particles. A black fume of tiny motes dispersed inside the container, the cloud of particles gathered and flied around, Eli noticed how the movements of the cloud resembled a double helix, ignored the plants and mushrooms and went directly to the flies.

The little insects contorted and then they disintegrated before the astonished eyes of the scientists. Even the androids shuddered at the sight.

-"That was horrific" Amelia exclaimed.

-"It went directly to the flies, like some kind of guided missile" Eli said.

-"MUTHER, what happened?" Florence asked the main computer.

-" _Collating…_ " the computer emitted a series of beeps and a minute later " _Analysis complete: Subjects disintegration at molecular level. DNA chains broken by exotic compound, mitochondrial uncontrollable mediatic decay detected._ "

-"What's your conclusion, MUTHUR?"

-" _The compound is a nanotech pathogen designed to attack only the genome of animal mitochondrial DNA, producing an uncontrollable decay during the RNA splicing. The simpler is the life form, faster the decay. There is no data to extrapolate which it will do to a more complex life form._ " The computer explained.

-"And there's no bloody way we'll carry the experiment further." Amelia said, and then turned to Ezra. "Ezra, sterilize the container, I want that destroyed."

Ezra typed on the console and ceramic metal shutters enclosed the container. Then a stream of plasma incinerated all inside it, until nothing was left. Temperature would be enough to break the nano-machines into inert elements, rendering the compound harmless.

-"Lucky for us there are no more of these urns on the ruins, or we would risk infection. Anyway, I need to make my report for the Institute. Any reference to the weapon must be left out. Rashid, I'll let you the part on the Titan ruins, I'll do the report for the buried _Rakshasa_ city." Eli concluded.

\- o -

A/N: So here it is, a new chapter. If you feel the chapters sound more like an Ancient Aliens chapter than an adventure story, let me know. I'm trying to make sense of the Engineers' technology by comparing them with the Titans in Greek mythology and the Devas on Hindi, the Predators fit perfectly on the Rakshasa definition and of course, the black goo or neomorphs on one of the most powerful celestial weapons. On the next chapters Eli and Co will be looking for the final rest of the weapon before a well known party get it for their own purposes. Please comment and review.


	12. Chapter 11: Of love and other Demons?

**November 10th, 2112. Community center at Kinnor colony**

The party started at 2100 hours, just before the dusk. Eli and her team had completed the report on the ruins and that meant additional bonus for the colony.

Alan Hartford had the idea for throwing a party in the newly finished community center where they had set up a temporary exhibition of pieces from the ruins before they'll be sent to the Institute on Earth. These included pottery, figurines and sculptures representing Titans and some artifacts unearthed from the buried city: skulls, weapons, and other artifacts of unknown purpose.

That was one of the few occasions the colonists had the opportunity to wear a more formal outfits asides from their habitual overalls and more utilitarian clothes. The greenhouses were working at full capacity and although there had been almost two years since the colony's foundation the first batches of wine were ready.

-"Oh hell, I really missed a fancy party, isn't Alan?" Amelia exclaimed, passing the glass of wine to her husband. She wore a silk silver dress ad hoc with the Swarovski glass decorating the center.

-"Right, a big change from the beer and daily coffee" Hartford sipped the wine. "Dr. Monygham, can we start the exposition now?"

-"Sure, if you do the honors, we can start the show. Where's Mr. Kane?" Eli asked. She had an olivine simple dress and a necklace of the same material she had purchased at the colony. "Oh, there he is" Kane was walking towards them, still struggling with the tie.

-"Oh right, ladies and gentlemen. May I have your attention please? As you know, during the last week the Wellington Institute of Technology staff worked on the ruins discovered on this planet, and the preliminary report will be sent in the next transmission" the administrator started "That means, the next ship coming here will had the proper discovery and salvage bonus for everyone, but also once we receive the confirmation the _Hawass_ will transport some of the pieces to Earth, so before that happens, we decided to mount an exposition which will last until the ship departs –and is the perfect excuse to throw a party in our new community center. Dr. Monygham here will give us a review of some of the pieces as an exclusive, so enjoy the evening."

The colonists applauded and Eli stepped on.

-"Are we alone in the universe? One of the biggest questions was responded here, on this planet, by you. No, we aren't alone." Eli started. "Of course we already knew there was extraterrestrial life since 2019, but the question actually referred to sentient life, to another civilization like ours with which to share art, science, medicine, philosophies... Well, what you have found here are not only one but two of these civilizations, and may have been on Earth in ancient times, inspiring myths about gods and demons among the first humans."

The door leading to the exposition room opened and Eli invited them inside. Everyone moved toward the showcases.

-"It was believed extraterrestrial civilizations would be different, exotic and alien, but the thing is: They're very, very similar to us" Eli continued, standing on the first case "Including their taste for war."

The case contained an array of weapons found in the trophy room. Unlike the city of the Titans, whose ruins contained only urns and vessels for storing food and for religious ceremonies, the _Raksashas_ stored a lot of different types of weapons. Displayed there were stone spears, metal spears, axes and ceremonial daggers

Jonas Trenton admired some kind of metal disk, the edge looked very sharp.

-"What is that, Dr. Monygham?" He asked.

-"That is a disc weapon. In proto-Indo European and Sanskrit is called a _Chakra_. It is said _Sudarshana chakra_ was the weapon of god Vishnu and had the property of return to the owner after killing its target." Eli explained "But I had no idea the _Raksashas_ used that kind of weapon"

-"Well, It's believed Vishnu obtained the weapon after killing a _Danava_ on top of a mountain." Rashid interrupted. "A _Danava_ is a kind of demon related to _Asuras_ and _Rakshasas_."

-"You mentioned _Rakshasas_ before, but what are they?" Trenton asked again. Eli and Rashid guided him to the sculpture.

-"This is a representation of a _Rakshasa_ we found in the trophy room. As you can see, they are a kind of humanoid demons which in the myth hunted humans and some of them were cannibals, some were skilled warriors who fought on both sides of the war." Rashid said

-"This one here was one of the cannibal hunter type I guess" Trenton concluded, after seeing the fiery face and sharp fangs of the humanoid being.

-"Not necessarily, warriors took trophies from their adversaries, and in not so few occasions, kidnapped women as wives and slaves"

-"Wives? How can they –?" Trenton asked "They're not human at all"

-" _Rakshasi_ Hidimbi shapeshifted into a woman and married hero Bhim after he defeated her brother" Rashid continued

-"I've been with ugly women before, but believe me when I tell you that not even for a million dollars I would marry that" Trenton pointed at the sculpture of the humanoid hunter.

-"Myth says the _Rakshasa_ and their female counterparts _Rakshasi_ could change into a human form," Eli intervened "That's ridiculous, but if you look at the next items, I think this is how it was done"

The mask was smooth, slightly oval shaped with two large eye openings, covered by a visor of some kind. The upper part was flat, following the shape of the head of humanoids, but hiding the ugly features of their faces, like their prominent jaws and sharp teeth.

-"The mask hides their facial features. Also, the word for 'partner' it could not mean spouse, but may refer to a warrior buddy. It would mean that she saw in him his equal." Eli concluded. " _Ksathriyas_ or warriors had a strict code of honor. By honoring their enemies, warrior can pull themselves from the barbarity of war."

-"Impressive, Dr. Monygham" Gilbert Kane approached the trio, holding a glass of whiskey on his hand. "But tell me. Who do you considerate your equal Doctor? Certainly I know it's not an actor."

-"Neither an engineer, if that's what you're implying, Mr. Kane" Eli responded. The man may had saved her life but that didn't gave him the right to insinuate himself in that direct way.

-"Oh, C'mon. This is a party; at least you should get some fun, drinks, dancing. The report is complete and I'll send it early morning. Meanwhile, enjoy." Kane said.

Elisabeth hesitated; she had always been a bit impulsive and obsessed with her work, that there was very little time to have fun. Maybe the engineer was right, the work was done, and he had to stop thinking about demons and celestial weapons for a while, at least until she returned to Earth and conferences took up all her days.

-"Very well, Mr. Kane, Just one dance" She said, "But first, I want a drink."

\- o -


	13. Chapter 12: The City of Gold

**CHAPTER 12: THE CITY OF GOLD**

 **November 12st, 2112. Weyland-Yutani Corporation office at** ** _Cassiopeia_** **station around Gas Giant HR8832h aka Cetus.**

Sometimes, the arm still hurt. Konrad Volkov massaged the arm just up the prosthetic arm. Occasionally, he still has nightmares about that damn mission.

The huge explosion shook the mountain. Konrad Volkov was finishing his morning coffee when he heard it. He saw the smoke column rise from the Atrium and then the west side of the mountain collapsed in an avalanche.

The other members of the team observed as the thundering wave of snow closed in their position. They ran toward the all-terrain vehicles but Volkov knew they didn't going to make it. He instead ran toward the transport and once inside he closed the ramp. Just in time the ice wall hit the ship, turned and sent it tumbling down the slope.

Volkov woke up three hours later inside the buried vehicle, a large crate was crushing his right arm and he was bleeding. He tried to lift the crate just to pull out his trapped arm, it hurt like hell but finally he did it. His arm was broken and blood poured from a long, serrated cut. He pulled out his belt and made a crude tourniquet, that stopped the bleeding but it will not hold forever.

It took another two hours for the rescue team to find the almost unconscious doctor and take him to the nearest Weyland-Yutani medical facility.

When Volkov woke up, he was inside a Pauling 850i med pod, the successor of the 720i model invented by Sir. Peter Weyland himself. The machine reconstructed his arm tissue from the shoulder to the elbow as the same time it placed the robotic prosthetic which will replace his lost arm.

He spent almost a month recovering from his injuries. Meanwhile, Weyland-Yutani had suspended project stargazer due to the loss of personnel and equipment at mount Ebrus. Volkov was reassigned to the recently formed U.A.O.R.D. fleet whose official duty was to maintain order on the outer colonies, but their real objective was to protect the company interests, quelling rebellions before happening, discretely dispatching terrorists and carrying out corporate espionage missions.

\- o –

After a long season patrolling the outer colonies and a bloody war, he was recalled to the nearest outpost in HR8832 for unknown reasons. The system was one of the first systems colonized by the company due to his 5 planets, two of them rocky super-Earth type planets and one a gas giant. The company established an outpost station around the Gas Giant Cetus for further exploitation of the rest of the system.

He passed the security check and headed for the Research & Development department where he was summoned.

-"Doctor Konrad Volkov, welcome back, please sit down" the director said.

-"Why am I here, Mr. Anderson?" Volkov asked, cutting the formalities.

-"We need you for a retrieve mission, one you're actually an expert." Anderson was a shady man, the kind of guy you don't mess up. Even Volkov was cautious on his presence.

-"And what's that?"

-"Hunter technology, no more no less" The director took a bottle from a cabin and served them two glasses.

-"Here we go again." Volkov thought. "There have been no incidents for some time, I'd fought in the bloodiest battles of the Torin Prime civil war and they didn't show up, what makes you think they came back?" Volkov exposed, actually he was searching for any hint of the hunters' involvement on the war, but there was nothing. Apparently they had vanished from human history.

-"No, this is gonna be a lot easier, actually. There is no hunter involved; some archaeologist had discovered an abandoned Hunter city in Kinnor Minor, with a complete array of their tech." Volkov opened his eyes wide "with hints of another ancient extraterrestrial civilization and suspected xenotech*"

Anderson tossed a folder to Volkov, he opened it and read: "Lost cities of Tripura and their relations with the summer triangle, by Dr. Elisabeth Diane Monygham"

Elisabeth Monygham, the woman he had known at Mount Ebrus the day he lost his arm. That time she was only a postgrad student, now she was the expedition supervisor.

-"The expedition aboard the HMS Zahi Hawass is there investigating ancient alien ruins found by the colonists and your dear Dr. Monygham stumbled upon hunter tech, or at least some of their weapons."

Volkov checked the file again and saw pictures of some of the pieces: masks, daggers, spears, a set of armor, discs.

-"A ship is being refitted for you and your team to depart in a few days. Expecting to arrive in late-2112" The Director said.

\- o –

 **November 15th, 2112. Ancient ruins in Kinor Minor, site known as "** ** _Amaravanti_** **"**

-"What did you want me to see, Rashid?" Eli asked Nirajit Rashid, who had called earlier to one of the many6 temple chambers he had been investigating for the last months.

-"I translated part of the inscriptions on this mural." He said, pointing at a large wall filled with Proto Indo-European inscriptions.

-"Show me" Eli told him. Rashid commenced reading the story written in the basaltic stone.

-"Here, this story apparently is part of the great epic _Mahabharat_. It tells the part of Arjun's journey to heaven and his fight with the Asuras by order of his father Indra."

-"Mahabharat? The ancient epic you studied back in the Institute?"

-"Yes, and this is interesting. Those paragraphs relate something about the destruction of the cities, not one but two times by using the same weapon of mass destruction."

-"The _Pasupata_? Pandora's box?"

-"Here" Rashid started "Free from fear, set it on the _Gandiva_ *; and, bowing unto the three-eyed _Sarva_ [He meant Shiva] of immeasurable energy, let go [the weapon], with the object of vanquishing those foremost of the _Danavas_. As soon as it had been hurled, there appeared on the scene by thousands, all kind of beasts in multitudes. And on that weapon being hurled all the universe became filled with these as well as many others of various shapes. And again and again wounded by those beings, the _Danavas_ met their destruction. And, then, in a moment I slew all those _Danavas_. And, seeing they deprived of life, I again bowed unto that god –the Destroyer of Tripura."

-"Destroyer of _Tripura_?" Eli wondered "So, this confirm Arjun had the weapon and used it once again a city, this time by the instruction of one of the gods?"

-"Yes, in the epic, Arjun did penance in order to obtain the weapon from Shiva, once he had achieved the task; Indra called him and asked him to kill some enemies he hadn't defeated. This could be interpreted as a test, Indra had promised him all the weapons cache from the gods but only if he mastered the _Pasupata_ , a weapon of last resort no to be used against lesser enemies"

-"Much like the nuclear weapons last century" Eli agreed, Rashid nodded "Any idea where this other city was located?"

-"Just dispersed clues, there are mentions of master of the three worlds, also three cities of _Tripura_ ; three planets?" Rashid responded "Here, it says ' _the wives of the Danavas cried in distress like Kurari birds'_ , Kurari refers to Ospreys or fishing eagles"

-"Altair! The summer triangle!" Eli agreed "The asterism obviously was of great importance for ancient cultures but only if you look it from Earth. Configuration from any another system is meaningless, unless –"

-"Unless what, Eli?" Rashid asked her.

-"The summer triangle formed an almost perfect right triangle, the base for Pythagorean theorem and mathematics. It was discovered independently by Mesopotamia, Greece, India and China; or more accurately, by the cultures derived from Proto Indo-European culture!" Eli explained; archaeo-astronomy depended not only from telescopes and satellites, but mathematics and physics.

-"Math is one of the universal languages, along chemistry and music."

-"What can you tell me about that destroyed city, Rashid?"

-"City's name in the myth is called _Hiranyapura_ , the city of Gold. It's mentioned the city was in sky, or floating, and after the destruction fell into the ocean." Rashid explained -"Gold, as with the cities of _Tripura_ , made of iron, gold and silver. If this city is the Iron and Altair represents Gold that leaves Deneb as the city of Silver."

Eli was amazed "We need to prepare an expedition to Altair; I think a colony is being set up there. I just need to convince Gilbert Kane, now we had a better relation"

\- o -

Despite their initial discrepancies, for the last days, Eli had find out Gilbert Kane; his co supervisor was a nice guy. After the party in the community center she had discovered why the Engineer had trouble with certain substances.

Two years after enrolling in Bryce-Watkins Medical School, Torin Prime civil war and due to his military instruction on Gunning Foss Military School, he was recruited in a hospital ship in orbit around the planet attending injured marines. The constant stress and lack of sleep led him to medicate himself with morphine and other drugs. It was not unusual for other doctors to do it, but Kane was not careful and almost died of embolism product of an overdose, and was expelled from school.

-"We can't set another expedition to Altair without the consent of the Institute, Eli. You know that." Kane said from the office he had in the colony's operation center.

-"But we had strong evidence something is there. Just send a message. In the meanwhile, I'll make preparations; maybe some of the colonist here wants to go, the Trenton brothers, Amelia or even the Blackburn's, the first phase colonization is complete and a ship with new inhabitants is coming here."

-"Very well; I'll do what I can but can't guarantee anything."

\- o –

A/N: *Xenotech refers to alien technology, Xeno is the greek term for 'alien' or in this case 'extraterrestrial'

*Gandiva is the mythic bow of god Varuna which was given to hero Arjun for defeating his father Indra.


End file.
